Tales Of Fire
by Rheessa
Summary: My own dumping ground for Marco x Ace drabbles. Ratings vary from chapter to chapter. Drabble 19: Blood Obligation
1. Little General Marco

**Sup!**  
**So, I decided to create my own dumping ground for drabbles. Not beta'ed. This one here was inspired by a movie Little Big Soldier. **  
**Rating: K+/T **  
**Song of the drabble:_ Not Gonna Die_ by _Skillet_**  
**Disclaimer: nope, not mine. Valid for all future chapters of this drabble gathering.**

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Marco was running as fast as he could in the forest terrain. At the moment he wasn't as fast as he would normally run for his life, maybe because he had an arrow in his right thigh, his left shoulder and slightly below his left scapula. The archers were damn good, a little better and he'd be dead meat. He had to admit - this time Akainu outdid himself, setting up an ambush so skilfully that Marco noticed it only last minute. That resulted in death of the whole escort he had with him, leaving only him alive. He was instantly reminded that the archers still had time to correct that when another arrow hit its mark, this time it was his right shoulder. Marco stumbled forward, fell though the bushes in front of him and rolled down a steep slope hidden by the very same bushes.

The roll down was dizzying, fast and extremely painful. The arrows that hit him all broke off and got pushed in deeper into his body. The one beneath his left scapula must have pierced his lung because when his fall was abruptly stopped, he started coughing; familiar taste of blood on his tongue. Knowing that he couldn't rest, Marco tried to get up but something pushed him back down and a voice said:

"Stay down."

There was no way that he'd listen to whoever said, so he tried to crawl despite his vision going black. Something pressed into the small of his back and the same voice said again:

"Stay down."

"Hey! Who are you!" another voice yelled that Marco recognised as the leader of the ambush. His vision cleared a little and he saw a part of a dark leather boot. "Hold him there in the name of General Akainu!"

"How many are they?" the owner of the boot asked in a slightly lower voice, making Marco think that the owner of the boot, who he now undoubtedly recognised as a male, was talking to him.

"Eight..." Marco wheezed, coughing up more blood.

"Eight men, on horses, pursuing a poor cousin of mine for their own entertainment, how awful..." the man said mockingly, followed by a sound that Marco recognised as drawing of a bowstring. "Of course I have to protect my relative from those bandits... And there is number eight, perfect."

Marco lay there confused – for a moment he even forgot about his pain, trying to figure out what this man was talking about because Marco was definitely sure that he didn't have any relatives in this part of the country. Then came 'twangs', one after another in quick succession. He counted eight 'twangs' before the owner of the boot said to him in a normal voice:

"Stay here... although who am I talking to, you won't be able move, much less get up and go somewhere by the looks of you," the voice was sounding a little smug. Despite how much it irked Marco, he knew that the voice was right – he had trouble breathing and seeing, he wasn't about to trot off anywhere.

So he lay there, trying to breathe normally and wondering what the man who, most probably, just saved his life was doing. By the time the man came back, Marco didn't have any strength left to protest when the stranger carefully bound his hands together. For a moment he was worried, but then the man moved him, lifting his arms to put them around the stranger's neck and Marco realised that he would have moved a semi-conscious body the same way. He was barely registering what was happening to him because of the pain, he tried to ignore it and concentrate on his breathing.

"We can't go into the village until it gets dark. If you were pursued by Akainu's men, it's only a matter of time before they catch up to what happened," the stranger huffed under Marco's weight. "You have a name, mysterious person?"

"M-marco," he wheezed, figuring that the situation couldn't possibly get worse.

"Marco it is then. Nice to meet you, I'm Ace," the man introduced himself. "Listen up, Marco, here's what we're going to do. You hang on tight, do your best to survive until nightfall and I'll do what I can to keep you alive until we can get into the village."

"W-why..."

"Why what? Why I helped you? Well, I don't really care about you but if Akainu wants you dead I will do anything in my power to keep you alive," Ace responded, adjusting his hold on Marco. "I killed his men because of you so you better don't die on me. I'm not willing to put my life on the line for nothing."

"T-that... wh-whould... be... un... for... tu... nate..."

"Still have your sense of humour? Impressive," Ace said with amusement; Marco found that the stranger's voice distracted him from the pain so he needed somehow to keep the man talking.

"Wh... why... you... here?"

"I was hunting. Only this time the catch of the day isn't going to end up on the table... Well, not as food anyway," the man stopped talking for a moment to climb up a rocky ledge. "I would ask you why he wants you dead but that's none of my business, unless you'd like to share?" Ace continued walking, seemingly not tired at all.

"Later..." Marco wheezed, knowing that if the man was going to see to his injuries, he'll know the reason soon enough.

"Alright. Does my talking annoy you?"

"No... k-keep..."

"Alright. You had your chance to say 'shut up' to me, now you'll have to listen to my rabble. Maybe it's a good thing – you'll get so annoyed at me that you'll want to shut me up yourself so you'll stay alive just to do that. Hm, you know, this isn't very different from how I usually am - I talk a lot to myself so you don't need to answer, just grunt or something from time to time so that I'd know you're still alive."

Marco coughed both as a sign that he was still alive and instead of a laugh. Who knew he'd be so lucky?

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**Damn, why can't I come up with an original plot by myself? I just keep getting 'inspirations' and doing interpretations... **

**Thanks for reading another 'inspired by something' something.**

**~Rhe.**


	2. Less Talking More Solving

**Desperate people that don't want to study do desperate things... like writing a drabble when they are supposed to be studying.**  
**This one actually my own idea (yay for that!). No beta.**  
**Song of the drabble: _Up In Flames_ by _Icon For Hire_**

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Marco grit his teeth as he wrote an equation on the whiteboard. The whole class diligently wrote it down after him except for one person, Portgas D Ace, who had the guts to sleep in his class. Marco wasn't a monster, he knew that the students had other problems besides his math and he looked the other way when students from time to time brought other subjects to his class. However one certain individual thought that Marco's lessons were a wonderful place for a nap. He would have ignored it if it happened once or twice but not every single bloody lesson! Today was the last drop into Marco's already full cup of patience.

"Mr. Portgas, would you be so kind as to get over here and solve this?" the blond said in a strict voice.

He rarely used that voice in class, reserving it only for times when he was really pissed. The students knew that already so the whispered conversations throughout the classroom stopped abruptly. Everyone looked at the person dumb enough to piss Marco off. After a couple of months with their new math teacher they quickly learned that making Marco angry was not an option.

Portgas D Ace remained blissfully oblivious as he continued sleeping without any indication that he heard what the teacher said. A blond friend of the annoying student roughly shoved his friend to wake him up.

"Wha...? Is it over?" the sleepy student said with a yawn.

Marco's eyebrow twitched in anger making the students in the front row shrink in their seats.

"Mr. Portgas, would you be so kind as to get over here and solve this?" the teacher repeated in a voice that left no room for argument.

"Why me?" the idiot student said defiantly.

"Now."

Marco didn't raise his voice but even the worst troublemakers in this class stopped grinning, knowing that their teacher was one step away from unleashing nine plagues of Egypt on the entire class. Portgas' blond friend shoved his stupid and (depending on whether or not he'll piss off Marco even more) maybe former best friend out of his seat. The newly awoken maybe former best friend glared at his also maybe former best friend, but moved to the whiteboard where Marco handed him a marker.

"What am I supposed to do with this?" the annoying student pointed at the equation with the marker.

"Simplify it," Marco went to the teacher's desk and sat in his chair. "The rest of the class please do it quietly in your notebooks."

Students quickly started scribbling in their notebooks. Portgas D Ace was staring at the whiteboard as if he saw it for the first time in his entire life. Marco stared at it as well. The equation wasn't very simple if you slept through the time when he explained a similar one.

"Is this your last class for today?" Marco asked his students who nodded enthusiastically. "When you're done with this equation, do the homework you got at the beginning of this class and bring me your notebook for checking. If everything is right – you are free to go."

His students nodded even more enthusiastically – everyone wanted to finish early on a Friday. Portgas kept staring at the whiteboard, frowning thoughtfully. He started writing something, erased it and started again. So far he was on the right track, maybe Marco was wrong about him.

(^_^)

Ace stared at the monster on the whiteboard – he had no idea what to do with that stupid equation. What the hell got into Marco today? After some more thinking and staring, Ace saw one thing he could do with the equation. What he wrote down seemed legit so he tried to see what to do next. It wasn't going too well – he didn't have a slightest idea.

Meanwhile other students started coming up to Marco to get their homework checked. The teacher quickly scanned it with his eyes and quickly signed it with a red pen, allowing Sabo (treacherous bastard!) to finish early. Ace doubted that he would be leaving the school before he solved the stupid thing. One by one his classmates were leaving; some had to go back to their places to redo something, others got the green light on the first try. And then there was he, feeling like a complete idiot.

Finally the bell rang so Ace moved away from the whiteboard.

"Where are you going, Mr. Portgas?" said the teacher that in half an hour went from being Ace's favourite to the worst teacher ever.

"The bell..."

"You are not going anywhere until you solve that equation," Marco said sweetly with a happy smile on his face.

"But..."

"No buts, less talking more solving," the teacher said cheerfully; Ace have never seen his teacher so happy – he looked like a cat that ate a whole bucket of cream.

"You can't be serious!"

"Now, now, I can be whatever I want to be. You, on the other hand, are not leaving the school until you are done. I'm not in a hurry, I can stay here all night and a whole weekend, but you, I assume, don't want that. So, less talking more solving," Marco looked so smug Ace wanted to punch him in the face.

With a growl under his breath Ace returned to the dumb equation. After two hours of writing and erasing stuff, he turned to his teacher who was comfortably reading a book with his feet on the teacher's desk.

"I don't know how to solve this," he admitted begrudgingly.

"Pity," Marco said without lifting his eyes from the book. "I guess we'll be staying here for the weekend."

"You don't have the right to keep me here!"

"Your guardian already allowed me to keep you here as long as necessary. Less talking, more solving – you were on the right track before you erased it," the sadistic teacher turned a page in his book; Ace grimaced at the mention of Garp – he had no doubts that the old man gave Marco permission to do whatever he wanted to Ace.

"Can I at least go to the bathroom?"

"Of course, just leave your phone here," Marco still haven't looked up from his book.

"It's in my bag," Ace lied.

"Don't make me get up and take it from you by force," the blond put out his hand palm up, waiting for Ace to give him his phone. "Thank you, you can go to the bathroom now," he said when Ace forcefully put his phone in his hand.

Ace stormed off to the bathroom cursing and swearing at the teacher he used to like. Who knew that jerk was so sadistic?! When he unwillingly returned to the classroom, the Sadist just finished talking on the phone to someone.

"I ordered us some take-out since it looks like we'll be camping here for a long time."

"Can't you just give me a hint or something?" Ace said angrily, ignoring his growling stomach.

"Oh, I gave you a hint. I solved an equation just like this one on the board in front of entire class. Too bad you weren't paying attention," the Jerk returned to his book. "If you're not done with this by eight I'll have to make a call to get a couple of sleeping bags here."

"You can't be serious!"

"Less talking more solving."

"I don't know how, okay?! Happy now?!" Ace yelled.

"I'll be happy when you will solve it, less talking more solving," Bastard waved his hand dismissingly at Ace.

"I don't know how!"

"And that is my fault because?" the Sadist finally looked up at his student.

"What the hell got into you today?"

"I'd watch your tongue if I were you," his teacher said calmly, returning to reading. "I could give you a couple more equations."

"Is that the worst you've got?" Ace sneered, thoroughly pissed off.

"Or I can make sure your body is never found, your pick," Marco smiled pleasantly at Ace making the latter wish he never opened his mouth. Or better yet – paid attention in class because somehow he believed without a doubt that he'll never be found. "Now, less talking more what?" the Psychopath looked at Ace to finish the sentence.

"Solving..." Ace sighed, returning to staring at the board.

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**For those interested I actually have an equation taken from a website of my previous math teacher:**  
**(9x^3 - 16x)/(9x^2 - 24x + 16)**  
**I was actually planning on putting it somewhere in the drabble XD**  
**Thanks for reading :D**

**~Rhe.**


	3. Cheers!

**Sup!**  
**Here's a continuation of the previous drabble :D I really, really don't want to study XD No beta.**  
**Rating: T-ish.**  
**Song of the drabble: _Chandelier_ by _Sia._**

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The day was relatively shitty for Marco – his students were complete idiots, his boss was a jerk and his neighbours decided that this was the evening to start renovating their apartment. Add everything up and there was no wonder Marco was sitting in a bar on a Friday night. Usually he avoided Friday nights at a bar like a plague but today was an exception. The bar he was sitting at wasn't too crowded due to it being on the second floor of a club where all normal, not grumpy, people were. Since his glass was empty and the bartender seemed to like flirting with customers that were a tad younger than Marco, he had to get the stupid bartender's attention.

"Hey, bartender, could you do a little less talking and more working?" he said with clear annoyance in his voice. However, something unexpected happened – the person next to him straightened in their seat and said at the same time with 'working':

"Solving..."

Marco did not expect that in the slightest. He slowly turned his head to see a familiar face staring at him with round eyes. No matter how old he was, Marco would never forget a wasted Friday from around ten years ago. Judging from the look on that familiar face, that person wasn't about to forget it that easily too. They stared at each other while the bartender came over and poured Marco another scotch, both completely baffled by the situation – the blond rarely ran into his students in bars (this being the first time) and that former student definitely didn't expect to see his former teacher either.

"This is... a surprise," Marco said, breaking the eye contact and taking a sip from his drink.

"Yes..." the former student drowned his own drink in one go and called the bartender with his hand; the blond begrudgingly noticed that the bartender almost ran to see to his former student's needs.

"So... How have you been?" Marco asked awkwardly.

"Fine..." the former student looked at his drink for a moment and then stared at Marco. "This is a gay bar." He informed Marco.

"No shit, Sherlock," the blond smirked into his drink.

"Sooo, what are YOU doing here?"

"Drinking," Marco informed him. "Because of stupid students among other things, by the way."

"What, no leaving them in school until 8pm? No threatening them?" the former student asked angrily.

"Don't tell me you're still hung up on that," Marco laughed. "Plus they are not THAT stupid."

"Traumatized me for life, you freaking sadist..."

"Is that so? Then what do you do for living, victim of the teacher's abuse?"

"Financial adviser at a bank," former student admitted after finishing his drink.

"Traumatized indeed," Marco laughed loudly.

"To hell with that, what are YOU doing in a gay bar?"

"Right back at you, Portgas, right back at you," the blond finished his own drink and glared at the flirting bartender.

Portgas D Ace looked the bartender as well, raised his hand and that jerk came running. Marco glared at both of them angrily – a couple of years ago he would not have been ignored like that. It annoyed him to no end, the fact that those youngsters considered him an old man. He wasn't THAT old!

"What got into you today?" Portgas asked sympathetically, noticing the angry look.

"Stupid students, dumb boss, idiotic neighbours and now that imbecile bartender," Marco snapped.

"Would you look at that – we have something in common," the former student smirked.

"What would that be? Except for the obvious fact that both of us go to gay bars."

"Stupid clients, dumb boss and idiotic neighbours," Portgas replied.

"Cheers to that," Marco raised his glass.

"Cheers," Portgas raised his glass as well, drank a little and spoke, clearly tired of holding it inside and ready to spill on any willing ear. "Can you imagine? I work like a slave week after week after week, haven't had a vacation in who knows how long, fix stupid finances for dumb clients and what does that old bitch do? 'Portgas, do you mind taking Helmeppo's clients, we are going on a family vacation. Thanks!' Like it's not enough that that mommy's boy checks out my ass like it's for rent, now I have to do his work too?! You'd think that after five years I'd get promoted or something, but no! That promotion goes to the mommy's boy! You'd think I could find another job, but no! I can't even take a day off to go for an interview because I need to pick up slack after that jerk! If I don't what do you think happens? I get yelled at because that jerk is a saint and has his mom running the show!"

"You really needed to vent," Marco nodded, thinking that his troubles are minor in comparison to that.

"Sorry," Portgas muttered into his glass, but he wasn't done yet. "And when I finally have an evening off I have to spend it in a bar instead of home on a couch because my idiotic neighbours decided that Friday evening was perfect time to start renovating their apartment!"

"We do have a lot in common," the blond chuckled.

"Your turn to share," Portgas said, looking visibly better after spilling all his troubles on Marco.

"There isn't much to share – students couldn't care less about math, they all but crashed and burned during the last test and the principal thinks I could do something about that. My neighbours love Friday evening renovation too, so here I am, getting ignored by the only person I thought would see to my needs," Marco looked at his once more empty glass with sadness.

"Sucks being us," the former student sighed, calling the bartender once again to fill their empty glasses. "Here's to me getting another job and to you getting normal students."

"Cheers," Marco nodded.

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**This drabble might get a third part depending on how much I don't want to study (and I really, really, really don't).**

**Thanks for reading, reviewing, favs and follows :D**

**~Rhe.**


	4. Failed Negotiations

**Here's another drabble, this time partailly inspired by Black Lagoon.**  
**Rating T-ish, no beta. **  
**Song of the drable: _Fly On The Wall_ by _Thousand Foot Krutch._**

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In the dim light of the bar it wasn't easy to see if there were people hiding in the shadows, however Marco wasn't worried about that. No one in this bar was stupid enough to start a fight with Whitebeard's men, well aware that old man could wipe out anyone dumb enough to do that. Marco leaned back in his chair checking the hand he got in poker. It wasn't good but it wasn't bad either. With some difficulty he chose three cards to change and leaned forward to put them on the table. Difficulty consisted of him having a lap full of a young man with unruly black hair that was hiding his face in the crook of Marco's neck. This young man was dressed in a pair of black cargo shorts with a big hunting knife strapped to his belt and black combat boots; his torso bare displaying several tattoos.

The biggest tattoo was on the young man's back, a purple and white mark of the Whitebeard family. A smaller one was on his left arm, big letters ASCE with crossed out S and another was on his right shoulder – an elaborated drawing of a phoenix, marking the young man as Marco's property. The young man seemed asleep but Marco knew it wasn't the case – ever since he bought Ace he noticed that the young man had trouble sleeping and eating, sometimes going for days without sleep or food. Almost a year passed since then and Ace still refused to sleep for more than an hour a day and only if Marco was standing guard, not that the blond could blame him.

The new cards were even worse than the previous ones so Marco decided to fold. Young man in his lap shifted a little, warning him about a threat from behind.

"What are you doing here, Thatch?" Marco asked when a gun touched the back of his head.

"I was feeling like frying a turkey today," the man behind him answered.

"Please put away the gun," Marco said with a sigh.

"That's new, you don't beg normally," Thatch laughed.

"I wasn't talking to you. As much as I would like to put a hole through Thatch's blabbing mouth, he's still part of the family," the blond said, his left hand soothingly stroked Ace's back.

"Hey, I don't have a blabbing mouth!" Thatch exclaimed angrily, putting his gun in its holster. "Aren't you playing it a little close, Marco? Allowing your new plaything to touch your weapons?" The man with pompadour walked around the table and sat in a chair across from Marco; the man occupying that very chair fled as soon as Thatch set his eyes on him.

"I remember saying that very thing to you about Izou," Marco snorted, reaching for the bottle on the table.

"And I still remember that, Marco," a beautiful Asian man dressed in traditional Japanese clothes moved to sit on a chair next to Thatch.

"Sorry, I am not a very trusting person," the blond smiled, taking a sip from his bottle; the game forgotten after all the participants fled the table.

"I can see that," Thatch snorted, waving to waitress to get to the table.

"How was your trip? Have you seen Oyaji yet?" Marco asked; Ace in his lap tensed again when new people walked into the bar.

"Like you haven't been reading my reports," Thatch rolled his eyes as he ordered his drink.

Meanwhile Ace raised his head to follow the newcomers with his eyes. Marco looked at them too – normally customers didn't get that much attention from his companion, there had to be something special about them. It weren't guns – every person in this bar had one save for Ace who preferred his hunting knife. Newcomers took a table in Marco's direct line of sight and openly stared at the mark on the young man's back. More people flooded into the bar, standing in a ring around Marco's table; other customers, sensing a brawl, hurried to get out of the bar before they got caught in a crossfire.

"Zis cood get really ugly," said one of the men at the table with a thick accent. "Give us ze runt and ve vill leev."

"Ой, что-то мне не верится," (Why don't I believe you?) Marco tried to guess the language the men spoke.

"Честное слово. Отдай нам щенка и мы уйдем." (Honest, just give us the runt and we'll go.)

"Понятия не имею о чём ты." (I have no idea what you're talking about.) Marco said, he didn't like where this conversation was going; Ace in his lap was like a coiled spring, ready to jump into action any second.

"О щенке у тебя на коленях. Наш пахан хочет его обратно," (I'm talking about the runt in your lap. Our boss wants him back) the man elaborated.

"Ничего не знаю, я за него заплатил как положено." (I don't know anything of sorts, I paid for him properly.) the blond answered, moving his right hand to his gun, ready for worse. Thatch and Izou didn't understand the conversation, but they caught the mood, getting their guns out.

"И мы вернем тебе деньги, не сомневайся. Серый, деньги, живо," (And we will give you your money back, don't worry. Sery, money, quick.) the man signalled to one of his henchmen and an open suitcase full of money appeared on Marco's table.

"И зачем же он вам понадобился? Продавали вы его весьма охотно, первому встречному," (Why would you need him? You were pretty eager to get him off your hands) Marco played for time, tapping his fingers on the gun to signal Thatch and Izou.

"Пахан передумал. Соскучился." (Boss changed his mind. He missed the brat.)

"Ага..." (Aha...) Marco nodded thoughtfully, noticing Ace's white-knuckled grip on the knife. He looked up to see the young man's face and in the grey eyes he saw it clearly – Ace would rather slit his own throat than return to these men. For as long as Marco had him Ace never said a word despite understanding several languages, so the barely audible 'please' came like a thunder on a sunny day. Marco smiled warmly at him and turned to the negotiator. "Sorry, not interested."

Then, before any of the men around them could react, he drew both of his guns; Ace already out of his lap, slitting a throat of a man standing behind Marco. The fight was violent but extremely short – the men around them were just henchmen, all brawns and no brains. Before they understood what was going on, Marco emptied both of his clips into the negotiator and the men behind him. Thatch and Izou weren't asleep either, effectively holding a round defence. Where Ace was Marco could only tell by the screams of pain and horror – he knew first-hand that the young man was extremely proficient with a knife.

The fight was over in a matter of seconds. Marco turned around to check where Ace was, slightly worried despite being aware of his skills. The young man's eyes widened when he saw Marco point a gun at him and when the shot sounded, he flinched but the pain never came. Instead there was a thud behind him, making him turn around swiftly, but the henchman was already dead.

"Sorry about the mess, Shakky. You can take the suitcase as a compensation," Marco said loudly. He moved to the exit but stopped when there weren't any footsteps behind him like he was used to. "What are you standing around for? Let's go home and get you into the shower quickly, you're soaked in blood," he said to Ace.

Young man beamed at Marco, quickly catching up to the blond.

"You're not hurt, are you?" Marco asked and Ace shook his head, smiling happily at him. "Let's go, then."

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**The presence of inspiration is very vague XD **  
**Thanks for reading, reviewing, favs and follows :D**  
**~Rhe.**


	5. Haole Hala Kahiki

**A really short drabble.**

**Rating: K+/T**

**Song of the drabble: Gypsy Star by Neon Hitch.**

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It wasn't often that Marco felt like a complete idiot, however standing in front of a hula school he sure did feel like an idiot. Hula dancing, in his slightly ignorant opinion, was strictly for girls, like Arabic belly-dancing. So why would his brothers think that getting him several hula lessons as a part of his early birthday present was a brilliant idea? Most likely it was Thatch's idea, in any case Marco wouldn't be surprised if it was.

Taking a deep breath, he pushed the door open and walked in. The lobby was spacious and well-lit. Surprisingly, the décor looked pretty modern, no palm trees in the corners or some kind of totems or any native thingies native Hawaiians could have had. White walls had multiple pictures with people dancing hula that Marco didn't pay any attention to, he just wanted to get this over with.

With that determination, he walked to the reception desk. There sat a young woman who was undoubtedly native – after tree days on Oahu Marco learned to recognise them. Her name badge said Kalea and the blond patted himself on the back for being right about his assumption.

"Welcome to Pomaika'i Hula School. How may I help you?" She asked, looking up from her computer.

"Um... what do I do with this?" Marco put the check for lessons on the reception desk.

"How long are you staying on Oahu?" Kalea asked after checking the paper.

"For another week," he replied, badly wishing the school was fully booked.

"Would you like to start today?"

"Sure, whatever," he couldn't even force himself to sound enthusiastic.

"Would this time work for you for the next five days?" The receptionist scowled slightly at Marco for his lack of interest.

"Sure," he shrugged.

"Alright," Kalea waited for the printer to release the paper and quickly wrote something on it. "Give this to Lani when you walk through that door, she will arrange the rest. Enjoy."

Somehow the blond was sure that the receptionist was going to enjoy his suffering. He took the paper and went where he was told. Behind the said door was a garden, protected from the outside view by a hedge. There, on the grass, sat a group of women discussing something lively.

"Excuse me, I'm looking for Lani?" Marco said, feeling very out of place.

"That would be me," someone said behind him. Lani turned out to be an old woman who, undoubtedly, could still kick the blond to the moon and back – she had very Pops-like aura about her. "What do you want?"

"I was said to give this to you," Marco offered her the paper Kalea gave him.

She took the paper and quickly checked it.

"Oi, brat, get over here!" she yelled after she finished reading.

"Just a sec, kupunawahine," a youthful male voice answered. "I can't find ipu!"

"Just get over here, I'll go find it myself. You have haole hala kahiki to teach," Lani said with a snort and went to the cracked door across from them; whatever she said in Hawaiian made women on the grass giggle.

"Haole hala kahiki?" The cracked door opened, revealing a shirtless young man.

If Marco wasn't as stunned as he was, he would have drooled. He had no idea they made them like that on Hawaii. The young man had a body trained to perfection – not too bulky, not too slim, but just perfect. His skin was tanned without any tan lines giving away that he most definitely was one of inhabitants of the island. His left shoulder and arm were covered by a tribal tattoo. He had a head full of messy black hair and stormy grey eyes that looked at Marco with curiosity. And were those freckles? That was it – Marco was sold, he could do whatever he wanted to the blond.

"Wow, haole hala kahiki! Cool," the young man said with excitement. "Come with me, hala kahiki," he gestured to Marco to follow him. "You can call me Ace."

"Marco," the blond forced out, following Ace.

"Hala kahiki it is then," Ace gave Marco a positively blinding smile. "Let me see if I can cram some hula into your head."

* * *

**According to my source:**  
**kupunawahine - grandmother**  
**ipu - one of musical instruments used in traditional hula.**  
**haole - foreigner/Westerner**  
**hala kahiki - pine-apple.**

**I would also like to apologise for Marco's ignorance and my butchering of the language and culture. Also, to those thinking like Marco - according to my source originally hula was performed by men only :D**

**Thanks for reading :D**

**~Rhe.**


	6. Thank You

**I am just as unwilling to study as, I believe, during writing of the second drabble. This one is a bit depressing, even I have no idea where this one came from. Of course no beta here.**

**Rating: M **

**Warning for character death.**

**Song of the drabble: _While Your Lips Are Still Red_ by _Nightwish_**

* * *

Marco looked at the phone in his partner's hand with hatered. They've been after this bomber for a little more than half a year. The bastard was incredibly cunning - he could make a bomb practically from a pen and a chewing gum, he was impossible to catch and, the worst part, he seemed to be the vigilanty type, meaning the public sympathised with him. Marco hated that psycho to the core. Now, the bastard has taken hostage an entire police station and demanded a meeting with Marco.

Knowing that odds were that he wasn't leaving the station, Marco tried to call his boyfriend but the call went to the voicemail. With a sigh he gave his gun and bulletproof vest to a policeman next to him and headed to the station. With his heart hammering in his chest, the blond entered the station keeping his hands visible to show he was unarmed.

He walked through the hall towards police desks, noting that hostages were huddled in the corner, all handcuffed to each other. In the center of the bullpen, on a desk with his left side to Marco sat the suspect. The blond went cold, noticing the slumped posture and a familiar mop of black hair.

"You know the moment when somebody's lover walks in on their significant other in bed with another person and they say it's not what it looks like?" The culprit lifted his head and to his horror Marco recognised his boyfriend Ace. "This is exactly what it looks like, Marco."

"Wha... How... WHY?!" Marco's hands flew up to grab his hair as he watched his lover put a robber mask on the desk he was sitting on.

"I am tired. I am tired that whatever we do, it's never enough. I'm tired that everyone are just sitting and looking at all the crimes, the corruption, all the criminals walking free because they knew whom to give money to," Ace said, indeed sounding tired. "The last drop was when the man that raped fifteen prepubecent girls walked free because of that corrupted judge."

"How could you? You are a highly decorated soldier, former special ops! You gave so much to this country, why would you turn against it?" Marco slumped against closest wall, completely drained.

"You are right, I gave so much to this country," Ace agreed with a sigh, "but one thing I can't give them is my conscience. The men I killed deserved punishment."

"You call this justice?"

"No, I don't. I don't like that word. My commanding officer called it justice when I blew up the hospital that was treating enemy soldiers. They called it justice when we turned a perfectly peaceful city to ash. They called it justice when we walked in rivers of blood... I don't like that word. I'd much rather say retribution since they got what they deserved. At least this time I didn't hurt any innocent people," Ace said; he sounded absolutely calm, slightly melancholic even.

"Is that your excuse?" Marco spat; to his disdain Ace was telling the truth - not one person without some serious skeleton in their closet died from his explosions.

"I don't make excuses, Marco. I thought you knew me better than this."

"Turns out I don't know you at all! And what is your end game? Did you call me here to blow me up with them?" He pointed at the hostages.

"The only person who will die here today is me, Marco," Ace said with a sad smile. "I want you to kill me."

"Not going to happen! I am not going to let you escape your retribution!"

"If it's not you, then one of the snipers on the rooftops. If not today then by the end of this month. Right here," Ace lightly tapped on his head with that same sad smile, "I have a ticking bomb. Ironic, isn't it?"

"Wha... what do you mean?"

"Half a year ago I was diagnosed with a brain tumour. It's inoperable." Ace shrugged casually. "I have until the end of this month tops. Sorry."

"I... I don't understand..." Marco shook his head violently. This whole situation was like his personal nightmare, he refused to believe any of this was happening.

"What is there to understand? I was put on death row before I started blowing up corrupt judges. I thought I should at least go with a boom," Ace smirked. "I looked death in the eyes too many times to be afraid now. She... she seems more of an old friend than a scary grim reaper now."

Marco's legs refused to hold him and he slid down the wall he was leaning on.

"I just wouldn't want you finding all of this out from anyone else, you wouldn't believe any of it... I know I wouldn't if the positions were reversed." Ace stood up, holding the desk for support. "Heh... this is one of the bad days, I'm not even sure I'll be able to walk on my own..."

Marco watched his boyfriend carefully lean to another desk next to him, take a gun, check it for bullets and slide it to the blond.

"Kill me, Marco. I'd rather it be you than a nameless sniper or the tumour," Ace slowly moved to sit on the floor, his back against the desk.

"I can't kill you, I love you!" Marco pushed the gun away from himself back to his boyfriend. What was Ace thinking, asking him something like that! Even knowing that Ace was the one that killed fifty people during those half a year, Marco was much more likely to take the bullet for him than to let him die.

"I was afraid you'd refuse," Ace reached for the gun on the floor and took it in his hands. "I am sorry for dragging you into this mess... There is no bomb this time, I couldn't stop my hands from shaking long enough to even start on one," Ace chuckled bitterly. "Tell Luffy that I am sorry for being such a lousy big brother. Tell everyone... tell them... thank you for loving me."

"ACE, NO!" Marco screamed, trying to get to him fast enough but all he could do was watch the world stop as his lover put the gun to the underside of his jaw and pulled the trigger.

* * *

**Told you it was depressing...**

**Thanks for reviews, favs and follows.**

**Hope to see you sooner rather than later,**  
**˜Rhe.**


	7. Maybe Not, Maybe Yes

**Sup!**

**This one is definitely not as depressing as the last one. Good thing today - I finally got my Endless Forms Most Beautiful album. Bad thing - I have my exam tomorrow and I don't want to study at all... No beta.**

**Rating: T+**

**Song of the drabble: _Heartbeat Song_ by _Kelly Clarkson_ (only because I haven't finished listening to the album).**

* * *

Ace was writing down his students' grades into the journal when he heard someone ask for him outside his booth. He put his work away, pushed away from the table and slid into the aisle between teachers' booths.

"Did someone call me?" He asked, making a spin on his chair to check both sides for people.

"And you are?" asked a male voice behind Ace.

Ace leaned back on his chair, throwing his head back to see who that was. For a moment there his brain melted, checking out the blond hottie in dark blue jeans, purple and black striped t-shirt and black leather jacket. To top everything off the hottie was sporting a mohawk, making it even harder for Ace to come back to earth, but he managed to do that because there was no way in hell a hottie like that would be interested in someone like him.

"Ace D. Portgas, and you?" Ace introduced himself, sliding his chair towards the hottie.

"You are neither old nor wearing a velvet suit nor do you have a cane, that I see... Care to explain?" the blond asked, looking genuinely confused.

"That would have been professor Jones but he retired in June. I'm in charge of his students now which brings back the question of your identity," Ace pointedly looked at the intruder above his glasses.

"Um..." the blond shook his head a little. "I'm here about Haruta Noda. The parent-teacher meeting?"

"No offence, but you are neither old nor do you have a prize-winning moustache, and you certainly don't look like a former biker. Care to explain?" Ace lifted his eyebrows.

"Oh, Pops had a last minute doctor's appointment so he sent me here instead. I'm Haruta's older brother."

"And do you happen to have a name?"

"Right. I'm Marco, Marco Jenkins. I work at the university biotech lab."

"Does Haruta know you're coming here instead of your father?" Ace frowned.

"Yeah, he's the one who suggested that since I have a day off today."

"If Haruta is alright with this then so am I. Just a moment, I'll get his folder and we can go somewhere quiet – it tends to get crowded here during breaks." Ace nodded and slid back to his booth. First thing he did there was curse the existence of hot older brothers and only then did he reach for the file, ready on his desk.

He almost walked into that older brother on his was out of the booth since the blond decided to follow him. Ace bit the inside of his cheek to come back to reality and said:

"Please follow me." He went towards the exit but stopped by one of the booths, "Hey, Robin, is there a free classroom now?"

Robin, who has been in the school a year longer than Ace, knew the schedule by heart. She looked at him with slightly raised eyebrows but answered nonetheless.

"I think your usual classroom should be free now."

"But isn't Iva-chan there now?"

"His class has some kind of project going on so they won't be using the classroom for another two weeks," Robin answered, eyeing the blond slightly behind Ace. "Excuse me, is something wrong?"

Ace also turned around to look at the rousing older brother. At first said older brother didn't even understand the words were directed at him, then he quickly looked from Ace to Robin.

"No?"

"My mistake, sorry," Robin said with a slight smirk that made Ace very suspicious of both his colleague and the blond.

"Thanks," he muttered. "This way, please."

Ace led the blond to the supposedly empty classroom, telling himself to stop dreaming because there was no way someone like that would be interested in someone like him. Someone like that would already have a girlfriend or a boyfriend that was both smart and beautiful. That girlfriend or boyfriend wouldn't be a simple high school chemistry teacher with multiple flaws.

(^_^)

When Marco agreed to go to that teacher-parent thing, he expected an older man with a cane, not a freckled wonder sliding around in a chair. He was sold the second that freckled wonder looked at him above his glasses, completely frying Marco's brain. Now that wonder was talking about Haruta's academic scores and Marco couldn't help but see tomorrow's newspaper headline – 'Teacher sexually assaulted during parent-teacher meeting'.

"And as you can see while Haruta's science grades are well above average, his language skills really need some improvement," the teacher noted, pointing to the grades on the paper presented to Marco to take home with him. In all honesty, Marco would much rather take the teacher home with him than a slip of paper.

"Fuck you're hot," he heard someone say in his voice. Judging by raised eyebrows and surprised look on the teacher's face, it was Marco himself who said that.

"When was the last time you had your eyesight checked?" the freckled wonder said with a snort, looking at Marco above his glasses. "I know a really good optician, I can show you his office – I'm having my annual check-up on Friday."

"Is that a date?" Marco blurted out.

"Jokes aside, I think Haruta should focus more on his language classes – science comes naturally to him, he just needs to brush up on the theory and he'll easily be at the top of the class."

"I wasn't joking," Marco wanted to punch himself in the face – that was very smooth of him. Rational part of him hoped to get the teacher's number in case he had to ask some questions and then maybe use that number for personal gain and ask him out for a drink. However it seemed like his rational part was knocked out by the irrational part.

With a sigh the freckled wonder took off his glasses, rubbed the bridge of his nose and put the glasses back on.

"I think we should stop here. You have the general idea of how Haruta is doing, if you have any questions – he knows my e-mail address."

While the teacher was gathering the file, Marco was mentally punching himself in the face. What the hell got into him? He knew nothing about the man in front of him except that he was Haruta's home-room teacher. For all he knew this freckled wonder was most likely straight... When the teacher bid him good-bye and moved to the door it was as if he was watching his body move on it's own.

Marco's right hand slammed already cracked door shut and his left got hold of the teacher's jaw to keep him in place long enough for Marco to kiss him. Freckled wonder gave out a surprised noise, dropping Haruta's file to the floor. The blond was mentally ready for any consequences from being kneed in the groin to a shiner and a very possible sexual harassment lawsuit, however he didn't expect the teacher to pull him closer and answer the kiss with a passion that blew Marco's mind.

Completely light-headed, Marco feverishly traced the body in front of him with his hands, relishing the feeling of hard muscles under the clothes. The man in his arms entangled his fingers in Marco's hair and pulled, making the latter groan loudly. That groan allowed him to sneak his tongue into the blond's mouth to explore for a short moment – as soon as Marco gathered some of his wits he turned the tables, completely dominating the kiss.

Ace moaned at the intensity of the feeling, pulling Marco even closer. That moan went straight into the blond's groin, making him realise that what he wanted was impossible right now. Using Marco's hesitation to his advantage, Ace broke the kiss and pressed his lips to the blond's neck at the same time yanking the jacket off.

"Fuck..." Marco groaned, allowing the jacket to fall to the floor. "What are we doing?"

"I think it's quite obvious," Ace's breathless voice made it hard for the blond to form a coherent thought but somehow he managed to do that:

"Not here..."

These words seemed to have worked miracle on Ace, who seemed to realise that he in fact was a teacher and this actually was a school he taught in. He pushed Marco away with surprising, given the circumstances, strength, making the latter take a few steps backwards to regain his balance.

"Out. Now." The teacher said in a stern voice, pointing to the door.

Marco was about to open his mouth to say something, maybe ask for a phone number but the look in the teacher's eyes stated clearly that if he didn't leave now he'd be thrown out. Thus the blond picked up his jacket and left first; Ace a step behind him, Haruta's file back in his hands.

"Hey, maybe..." Marco tried to start a conversation again but the freckled wonder locked the door and left without another word or even glance. "Or maybe not..."

He looked at the jacket in his hands and suddenly realised that Haruta's grades were left inside the classroom and according to the teacher Haruta had a way of contacting him via e-mail. That was a good reason in Marco's books.

"Or maybe yes," he muttered under his nose with a smile.

* * *

**Wasn't as bad as the last one, right? XD**

**Thanks for reviews, favs and follows!**

**Cya,**  
**~Rhe.**

**PS. Apparently I have a thing for writing school-themed fics, who would have guessed? XD**


	8. Flaw In A Plan

**Tried writing 7D, had a block, found this on my laptop and decided to finish it instead. Would you look at that, another school fic! Hogwarts AU meaning the school grounds were borrowed by me from JK Rowling. **

**Rating: K+/T**

**Song of the drabble: _Kom_ by _Timotej_**

* * *

This was definitely the worst prank Thatch and Izo ever played and not because it was two people instead of one who got pranked. This wasn't the first time they pranked either one of their victims, but it was the first time their prank had such an impact. The prank seemed ingenious when they came up with that, but the results were surprising to say the least.

It started when Izo noticed that when Marco was studying in the library, he attracted girls like a magnet (not that he didn't do that on daily basis, but in the library they were flocking around him). They started tossing ideas around until they found a perfect prank. The idea was simple – one of them had to stop by and forget an open pack of cauldron cakes. The prank was that half of them were filled with love potion (those with green and blue frosting were safe so that the one that 'forgot' the cakes could eat them and be fine) that made whoever ate them obsess with Marco. Both Izo and Thatch thought it would be hilarious to see their brother run away from a pack of love-crazed girls.

Thatch lost the rock-paper-scissors game and therefore was the one who had to plant the cakes on Marco's desk, which he did, executing his part perfectly, eating two cakes in the process – one with blue and another with green frosting. Then he was called away by Izo, who pretended to need Thatch for 'something urgent'. Together they hid behind the bookshelves and watched, giggling soundlessly. Marco never liked cauldron cakes, so they were sure that he won't eat one with potion by mistake.

Then everything went to hell. A moment after Thatch left Marco alone, into the library came another one of their adopted brothers, none other than Ace D. Portgas himself. Despite being a year younger and in another house (for Marco was in Ravenclaw while Ace landed in Gryffindor), teen got along with the blond extremely well. Both pranksters stared in horror when Ace sat down in front of Marco, greeting the elder with a smile.

(^_^)

Marco had always gotten along with Ace the best out of all his countless siblings. It sort of happened on its own - they weren't really like Izo and Thatch who were almost glued at the hip and Marco knew that Ace got along with everyone, even those who were ten years older, but he still chose to believe that Ace treated him slightly different than his other siblings. This, however, was a completely new kind of different.

Ace seemed totally fine one moment, talking about next Hogsmeade weekend excitedly, and then another moment he was imitating his 'fan club' as Haruta once put it. Namely he sat there, staring at Marco quietly, and was blushing.

"Are you alright?" Marco asked, reaching to check if his brother had a fever.

"I-I I'm fine," Ace stuttered, blushing even more when Marco's palm touched his forehead.

The blond just stared at his brother with round eyes – his brother never stammered. Something was definitely off, Marco thought with a frown and then his eyes stumbled upon the cakes left on the table.

"Did you eat any of those?" the blond asked and then slapped himself on the forehead. Of course he ate some, he was Ace D. Portgas, for crying out loud.

"Were they yours?"

"No, they were left here by Thatch," Marco sighed, closing his eyes. He was going to kill them. Later, though, for now he had to get Ace to Jinbe, who was the potions master at Hogwarts as well as family friend - he'd help for sure unlike the school nurse Nami, who wanted students to pay for her services. "Come with me," Marco quickly packed his things and stood up and went out of the library with Ace not far behind.

He was going to kill the idiots who thought that it was a funny prank. Whatever they put into those cakes had to be something annoying enough but relatively harmless, which significantly lessened the pool of suspects. Plus there had to be a few duds for them to convince Marco the cakes were harmless… like Thatch did, eating two in front of him. They were so dead after he was done gathering Ace's wits.

Since it was relatively late, the castle was empty – most of the students sat in their common rooms, but Marco, being the Head Boy, had some privileges like walking around the castle half an hour before curfew. He had no idea what the pranksters were thinking, starting their prank so late but, maybe, they had some other goal in mind. For example to feed the cakes to an oblivious brother who ate anything edible in immediate vicinity. Speaking of the said brother, Marco had no idea which potion could result in Ace wanting to hold his hand but the blond allowed it because his brother wasn't himself and Marco wasn't going to refuse him something that small and insignificant. Plus Ace didn't argue with him or refused to go to Jinbe so what could possibly go wrong?

A lot of things, apparently. Firstly, Ace seemed to take the gesture as some kind of 'good-to-go' sign because soon his arm sneaked around blond's waist and rested on the said blond's hip bone. Marco stared at the arm but let it be, choosing to ignore it completely. Secondly, the blond became suspicious when the arm started to move around, clearly exploring his body.

"Ace, stop that," he said sternly, hoping that it would be enough.

"Stop what?" the teen asked innocently; the intruding limb moved to the small of Marco's back.

"Touching me, stop that," Marco repeated strictly.

"Mhm," Ace answered and then that hand dropped and grabbed blond's ass.

Marco let out an embarrassing yelp, jumping in surprise and instinctively smacking the offending limb. He prayed to Merlin that no one heard or saw anything because the yelp was humiliatingly high. What more, Ace looked at him like a kicked puppy with his big sad eyes. Somehow Marco felt that he should have made the pranksters go to Jinbe with the result of their prank because it seemed like it's going to be much more problematic than he expected.

He continued to go to the dungeons, wary and keeping a close eye on his brother in case he got any ideas. The ideas were clearly there because Ace kept inching closer to him and Marco kept moving away from him, resisting the urge to cover his ass in case Ace decided to go for it again.

It turned out that he should have worried less about his ass and tried to think a little. Ace was known for thinking and acting outside the box. Even if he was affected by some kind of potion, it didn't necessarily mean that he was stoned. Marco realised that when his shoulder hit the stone wall and Ace moved so close, they were flat against each other.

"Marrrco," Ace purred, pressing Marco into the wall.

"Wh-what are you doing?" the blond stuttered; somehow he felt like a girl that had a date and was about to go home but her boyfriend had other, unplanned, ideas. He felt just as powerless as a girl would and, if he was completely honest, just as scared – this behaviour from Ace left him no clues as to how to react. Not only that, this was the first time ever he's been in a situation like this because normally he got away before girls could corner him in a similar manner. The fact that he recently realised that he was gay did not help in the slightest.

"What do you think?" the teen pressed himself even closer to Marco.

"I think we need to go to Jinbe. Right now," the blond blurted out, trying to take a step to the side but Ace caught on and took a step almost at the same time Marco did.

"Why?" He purred.

"Hey, you two! You should be back at your dormitories!" another voice joined in.

"Jinbe! Thank Merlin!" Marco quickly dove under Ace's arm and moved to hide behind their family friend.

"Marco? Ace? What's going on?" The potions master asked, confused.

"Nothing, we were on our way back to the dorms," Ace answered, eyeing Marco behind Jinbe.

"It's all Thatch and Izo, they spiked the cakes with something and he ate some of them!" The blond quickly said, making sure to have Jinbe between him and his brother at all times.

"I see," the potions master nodded thoughtfully. "Come with me, I think I have a good idea what it could be."

When Ace finally returned to his senses, both he and Marco swore revenge on their siblings. After they avenged themselves by doing the exact same thing that was done to them, both Thatch and Izo solemnly swore to each other to never leave any evidence that could be traced back to them behind ever again.

* * *

**There. I think I'm on a drabble spree...**

**Thanks for reviews, favs and follows :D**

**~Rhe.**


	9. How To Train Your Zombies

**Sup! This one came to me after watching a couple episodes of Walking Dead. In all honesty I don't understand why people like this show. Maybe there aren't any other zombie shows... Anyhow, no beta here either.**

**Rating: K+/T**

**Song of the drabble: _Waiting Fot The Sun_ by _Simon Erics_**

* * *

Ace enjoyed zombie movies as much as the next guy. Of course it was fun to watch people run around and get eaten by the undead. He certainly didn't expect that it would be his reality at the young age of twenty two. Until the outbreak normal people and Devil Fruit users lived alright side by side but that changed as soon as normal people realised that zombie virus didn't work on users. After series of prosecutions that led to many users being killed, people discovered that there was more to it. Users were like natural enemies of the virus – zombies went for them first, not stopping until they all but ripped the user apart.

A user attracted the undead like a magnet, gathering every single one of them from a radius proportional to their power. That's where seastone metal came in – before it was used to restrict users in jails and so on, now it was used by users themselves when they didn't want to alert every zombie in five kilometres radius.

Ace was a user and a handy one too – his power was fire. As soon any kind of government formed, they sent people to Mt. Corvo where Ace lived with his brothers to convince him to join them. It was annoying, but he could see what they were thinking – his powers were extremely useful in zombie extermination. Whoever had his allegiance could easily establish dominance over other states. So far he didn't like anyone – every single one of them thought about them first.

Still, he admired their determination and the number of suicidal people they could command – getting to Mt. Corvo meant crossing an incredible number of the undead. Reason for that was that even undead learned that if they come into Ace's territory, they will burn. Yet, when he left the mountain they all attacked him as if on a cue. Maybe if he wore anything made of seastone it wouldn't be the case but he had no idea where to find anything like that.

"Hy, Ace, we have new idiots sneaking their way here," his brother Sabo yelled from beneath the tree Ace was currently sitting in.

"Any idea where from?" he asked and climbed down.

"Nope. Let's go to the border to meet them?" Sabo asked.

"No." Ace smiled mischievously. "I'll make a wall. Let's see what they will do."

"Don't burn yourself," his brother chuckled.

"Fuck off," Ace snorted, starting to walk towards a burnt line that was the border.

Upon arrival he stayed in the shade of the forest, climbing another tree, and from there he made the wall of fire that often surrounded the mountain. Then he waited. Containing the wall wasn't straining at all – after all he just made it around the half from where the intruders were coming. With a big escort too – when zombies felt that he was by the border they started gathering in hopes that he would leave his territory and that they will finally get him.

Soon he could see them in his simple pocket binoculars – two men walking amongst an army of undead, wildly looking around. Apparently being so blatantly ignored was a new thing to them. Ace watched them from his spot in a tree, soon joined by Sabo and Luffy; the former managed to sneak some food past the latter for which Ace was grateful.

By sunset the intruders made their way to the fire wall. Luckily, brothers were hiding close enough to overhear their conversation:

"I don't think we are welcome here," said one of them.

"Gee, what gave it away? Right, a freaking wall of fire! Can't you just fly over it or something?" said the other.

"I don't think it would be a smart thing to do – as long as I wear the pendant I am not competing with the user on that mountain. I take it off and I become lunch for our lovely companions," snorted the first one.

"By the way, what's with that? I've never seen them behave like this."

While the intruders discussed the abnormal behaviour, three brothers quickly talked to each other and decided that they should at least greet their guests.

"Who are you?" Sabo asked sternly – this time it was Sabo's turn to negotiate. Unlucky were those that arrived when the turn was Luffy's. "What is your business here?"

"We are here to talk to the Firefist. My name is Thatch, I am commander of the fourth division of Whitebeard army," the second voice.

"That's a first. Never had such a big fry around here. Who's your friend?" Sabo asked, they exchanged looks with raised eyebrows.

"My name is Marco. Can we speak to the Firefist?"

"You are talking to him," Sabo snickered quietly; Ace gave his brother a toothy grin. Luffy was whining, demanding to go and kick some zombie asses, firmly held in his spot by two older brothers.

"Can we talk face to face?" The commander asked.

Ace shrugged and made a hole in the wall; zombies started to shuffle agitatedly around the intruders.

"'Can we come in' was what he was asking," the man called Marco said, looking at the waist high wall of fire between them and their target.

"I'd rather we come out to you," Sabo said with a grin at the same time as Luffy yelled:

"Let me go! I wanna kick zombie ass!"

"Can't you wait for five minutes?" Ace asked, rolling his eyes.

"But you and Sabo always steal all the fun!"

"Let him go, he can have a head-start," Sabo said with a smile, releasing his side of Luffy.

"Alright," Ace raised his hands.

"Awesome! Second Gear!" Luffy yelled and bolted.

"Is it alright to let him go by himself?" the commander asked with a worried expression.

"No need to worry," Ace said with a smile, him and Sabo taking a step forward simultaneously. The remnants of the wall in front of them disappeared and zombies were going crazy around them, pushing and howling, but still none tried to invade their borders.

"Are you sure we can't come in?" the commander asked sheepishly.

"Be our guests," Ace answered and he and Sabo finally stepped over the border.

The howling probably deafened the newcomers, unused to such behaviour. From above it probably looked like the earth boiled – so strong was the desire of the undead to see Ace and his brother torn apart; to Luffy's dismay zombies completely forgot about him. Each sporting a feral grin, Ace and Sabo sprung into action.

Not one person that came to the mountain in search for the fire user expected to see that there were two of them. The reason for that was... unique for the lack of other words. When they acquired the fruit, Luffy already ate his, so Ace and his brother had to settle it between them. The best way to solve it was, of course, game of rock-paper-scissors, best out of three. When it was a tie three times, they split the fruit in halves.

It took about fifteen minutes of blazing inferno to get rid of majority of the undead in front of them. The remaining ones scattered with sad howls, very unhappy with the outcome. Luffy, angry with his brothers for stealing all the fun, ran off to pursue them. After another quick game of rock-paper-scissors, Sabo followed their younger brother to make sure he didn't get lost on his way back, leaving Ace to finish the conversation.

"Did you enjoy the show?" He asked teasingly when he returned to the intruders.

"Wait a sec, how is this possible? I thought the blond one was the user..." the commander said with a confused look on his face.

"Technically, all three of us are. Just in case you decide you can get what you want by force."

"That wouldn't be smart," said Marco and Ace took a closer look at him, illuminated by the still present wall of fire.

Let's just say that living on the mountain left Ace will about zero handsome men around him. Of course, Sabo was good looking and Luffy looked cute, but that was just wrong in Ace's opinion. The man in front of him had blond hair, a shade lighter than Sabo's, tan skin and an incredible built that clearly showed that the man in front of him fought a lot. He couldn't see the colour of the eyes from that distance and with that lighting, but it was either green or blue for sure. Ace mentally crossed his fingers for blue.

"Who are you?" Ace asked, his eyes focused on the visible pendant that they overheard them discussing.

"We are..." the commander started to explain, but Ace cut him off.

"Not you. What I want to know is who is the person calling himself Marco."

"Why?" the man demanded.

Ace did his best to suppress a shiver that he felt when he thought how appropriate that commanding tone would be in a bedroom.

"Either name yourself or leave," Ace said, hoping that the reason, namely him, was important enough for them to answer his question. He didn't want to appear desperate but it was really long time since he got any action that didn't involve his hand.

The intruders exchanged glances, sighed and then Marco introduced himself:

"First division commander of the Whitebeard army, Marco the Phoenix."

Ace felt his jaw drop – the Phoenix was legendary. His powers were somewhat similar to Ace's, so he was quite effective in extermination of the undead. Why would anyone send someone as important as the Phoenix to drag him out of his hole was beyond Ace's understanding.

"Wow, definitely a big fish..." Ace said after coming out of his stupor. Unfortunately, he was heard.

"WHERE'S A BIG FISH?" Luffy launched himself at Ace like a cannon ball, taking his brother down before anyone could react.

"Over there..." Ace groaned, pointing to the Phoenix from his crater.

"MEAT!" Luffy yelled again, jumped on the blond intruder and tried to bite him. Luckily Sabo got there on time to pry their younger brother before he bit anyone.

"Lu, how about you go get us a croc?" Sabo smartly redirected Luffy's attention before anyone mistook him for a flesh-eating zombie.

"Meat, yay!" Luffy sped away to the river.

"Are you alive?" Sabo asked with a smile, standing above Ace's crater.

"No, I'm one of those undead morons. Give me a hand."

"Up you go," the blond brother helped Ace to his feet and turned to the intruders. "Come. We'll figure out what to do with you tomorrow."

* * *

**There. To finish my thought from the beginning of the drabble - I think that The Walking Dead show sucks. I'll stick to zombie movies, thank you very much.**

**Cya,**

**~Rhe.**


	10. No Jokes Allowed

**Sup!**

**Sooo, this is a stress drabble, started back in April when I had more time. It is inspired by Korean drama 'The Master's Sun'. No beta as per usual.**

**Rating: K/T**

**Song of the drabble: _Monster_ by _Eminem feat. Rihanna_**

* * *

First time Marco saw him was when he moved into the apartment complex. He was standing by a bench outside the entrance and was talking to thin air. The blond pretended he didn't see anything but he quickly asked a couple of neighbours about him. It turned out that the kid was completely lost to this world, talking to empty spaces and doing generally weird things. Since the helpful neighbour said that the kid lived with his brothers that kept track of him, Marco didn't worry too much about it.

Given that Marco didn't meet many people that weird, he paid a little more attention to the kid – he found him very entertaining. On multiple occasions he overheard the kid talking to a trash can or mailbox or swatting at thin air. Marco couldn't help but snicker at the annoyed expression on the kid's face, his inner self chastising himself for laughing at a sick person. Deciding to try and make up for his less than mature behaviour, the blond tried to approach the kid to ask him out for coffee.

"Excuse me," Marco said to the kid, who was muttering something under his breath. "Excuse me," he tried to gain attention again.

"Get in line! Or better yet – get lost! Go bother someone else, I have enough of you guys following me, I don't need another one." The kid snapped at Marco, waving his hand angrily and accidentally hitting the blond on the nose. Marco's hand flew up to massage his nose as the kid stared at him with round eyes. "You are an actual person!" he exclaimed after poking the blond a couple of times.

"Last time I checked I was one," Marco said, crossing his eyes in an attempt to see if his nose was alright.

"I'm really sorry about hitting you – normal people don't talk to people like me very often..." The kid seemed genuinely awed by that sole fact.

"People like you?" Marco asked, finally deciding that his nose was fine.

"Nutjobs. Wierdos. Crazy people," the kid elaborated with a wave of his hand.

"And why are you crazy?"

"Because I can see ghosts and they seem to think I'm the one that should fix whatever is keeping them from moving on," he answered seriously.

Marco thought about it for a moment, taking a closer look to the kid in front of him. The kid was in his early twenties, had a head full of tousled black hair, grey eyes and abundance of freckles on his face. Despite having all he needed to look extremely good, the kid resembled freshly risen zombie.

"So... There is a ghost in the trash can outside the entrance?" Marco finally asked.

The kid turned to him with eyes that were even wider than before – apparently he assumed that after his confession Marco wouldn't want to talk to him anymore.

"Er... He's not in a trash can, he stands just next to it and picks up the trash that missed the can. He really hates it when people don't put their trash inside the can."

"What about the mailbox?"

"She's been here for ages – she keeps waiting for the letter from her boyfriend. I went to the post office a couple of times but they don't have the letter."

"And the bench?"

"Just a couple of grannies who like to sit there on sunny days and gossip – apparently they were good friends before."

"Why do they bother you?" Marco asked after some thinking. He was itching to ask if the kid was on any kind of meds but that would be extremely rude of him.

"Heck if I know. Or, rather, I have one theory – I was in an accident a couple of years ago and, according to doctors, I died for ten minutes on the table. I think it has something to do with that," the kid said, eyeing Marco with suspicion.

"That must have been a terrible accident," the blond frowned.

"You don't have to force yourself. If neighbours see you talking to me they will think you're crazy too."

"Well, I can always say you make an interesting case study," Marco attempted to joke.

"Whaddya mean?" The kid frowned.

"I'm a psychologist," he said with a straight face. It was a blatant lie – he worked at an industrial company, being in charge of logistics.

The reaction to that was instantaneous – the kid immediately became defensive, looking at the blond none too kindly.

"That explains everything," the kid growled. "Why aren't you asking me if I'm taking my meds like I'm supposed to? Are you here to evaluate if I'm dangerous?"

"Sorry, sorry, it was a bad joke on my side," Marco raised his hands in a peaceful gesture. "I've only ever had one course in psychology for advertising and the only thing I remember is that bright colours attract the eye."

"Then where do you work?" the question was asked rather aggressively, demanding an answer.

"I'm head of logistics for Yonko – I have nothing to do with any of that soul-digging crap that is psychology. I am really sorry for such a bad joke – my brothers constantly tell me that when they gave out sense of humour I was standing in line for meticulousness."

"So, in other words, you are petty."

"Mostly at work," Marco had no idea why he was trying to rehabilitate himself in the eyes of this crazy person.

"Is that why you live alone?"The kid asked; by the looks of it he was slowly lowering his guard again.

"What are you, my brother?" Marco asked with fake indignation.

"No, I'm Ace, your crazy neighbour from the apartment above yours," the kid introduced himself with a small smile.

"And I'm Marco, a new resident here who can't tell a joke to save his life."

* * *

**That's about it. **

**Thanks for reviews, favs and follows!**

**Cya,**

**~Rhe.**


	11. His Own Terms

**So today I passed another subject without actually knowing anything about it. Do not fret - the first one was biophysics and this one was informatics and biostatistics. In my opinion this drabble has potential to be a longer story but I'd like to know if I'm not the only one thinking that. **

**Rating: K+/T (though if expanded definitely M)**

**Song of the drabble: _Sabri Aleel_ by _Shereen_ (and yes, I know this is supposedly junk music. I just think that this song (though mostly intro) would fit a port and I found it slightly ironic after googling for translation of lyrics).**

* * *

Ace hurried to the Master's of the City audience hall with the parcel held gently in his arms. Inside the parcel was something that he could only call a masterpiece – it was a painting of the city but it was made of fine silver. Ace himself could not do anything as detailed and beautiful as this piece yet though his work was recently sold for a good price. The piece of art in his arms was made by his teacher who had worst temper in the world, tended to break Ace's work over Ace's own back and work Ace like a slave but he was an artist like no other – people from all over the world came to buy his work, even the worst of it. Even more people came to ask to be his apprentices but he usually kicked them out, yelling that one idiot was enough.

Despite having quite a temper himself, Ace never argued with his teacher – though he was still an apprentice, his work was much better than any other craftsman in the city and that was saying something. Ace did not fool himself – he knew if it was up to his teacher Ace would still be doing dishes in the kitchen. The only reason he was chosen was because he possessed the same power as his teacher, namely had complete control over fire. A gift like that was rare – in his whole life Ace had only seen two people that could control fire – himself and his teacher.

He waited for the guard to open the door to the audience hall and walked in but stopped abruptly. The Master of the City already had a guest. Ace froze on the doorstep, unsure what he should do – on one side the Master called for him, on the other – the guest looked important, dressed in ultramarine silks with golden embroidery and with a heavy guard armed to their teeth.

"Good, come here," the Master made an inviting gesture towards Ace; compared to his guest the Master looked... well, shabby. He didn't have the regal bearing nor the finest silks his guest possessed. It must have pissed the Master off to no end because Ace recognised the look of hatred and anger under the perfect guise of hospitality. "Please take a look at this - it was made by our best jeweller."

The Master made a quick sign to Ace, who carefully unwrapped the cloth around the painting and offered it to the guest with a respectful bow. He tried to avoid to look at the guest's face as much as possible – he knew that a lot of nobles hated when people of lower class than them looked them directly in the eyes.

"_He says that this was made by their best craftsman," _Ace heard a translation. He slightly frowned at that – he started to have suspicions about the identity of the guest. Despite spending most of his time in the workshop, Ace still heard an occasional rumour or two and if this was who he thought it was, he was screwed.

"_It is a beautiful piece of art indeed,_" the man said; the translator immediately said as much in the language used in this city. Ace did not have any problems with the language – among other things his teacher drilled into him were multiple languages so that he could speak to any customer entering the shop. It was useful since this was a port city and a big trading point with many foreign merchants entering the city every day. "_Correct me if I'm wrong – this is work of Sarmish, isn't it?"_

The Master waited for translation, though Ace knew that he knew the language his guest was speaking in, and answered:

"You are correct. This young man is his apprentice."

Ace inwardly cursed the Master and all his ancestors and descendants to wander the afterlife without ever reaching the paradise for all eternity. He now knew exactly why the Master called him in now – Ace was a bribe.

"_Look up,"_ the guest ordered; Ace decided to follow the Master's lead and waited for a translation before glancing up at the guest and averting his gaze again. He heard the fabric rustle as the guest rose from his seat and took a step towards him. Gentle yet firm fingers lifted his chin to take a better look at his face; Ace glared down and to the right at the Master letting him know that if it wasn't for the guest he would have torched the man. The Master had the decency to mouth 'sorry' to him with an apologetic look on his face. Like that would help him now! Ace found comfort in the fact that the Master would have to explain to Ace's teacher what happened to his only apprentice. "_Look at me," _the man reminded Ace of his presence. He waited for the translator to do his job before making his best 'death threat glare' at the guest, locking his eyes with azure ones. "_Stubborn, aren't we?" _The man murmured.

It took all he had not to growl 'you have no idea', remembering only last moment that he wasn't supposed to understand the language. As he glared at the guest, whose identity was very clear to him now, Ace kept reminding himself that, unfortunately, this particular person wouldn't burn. And even if he did – the consequences of such actions were devastating. Best case scenario would be that the city would be razed to the ground.

"_I accept this generous gift, Master," _the man said with a smirk that made Ace want to smash the priceless piece of art over his head or at the very least kick him in the shin. "_You will have our favour." _

Despite being a man, Ace badly wanted to knee that man in the groin. The man would heal in a moment anyway and Ace would have had the satisfaction of seeing him in pain but chances were that he would be on the floor before he even raised his leg. The man made a sign to his guards that surrounded him and Ace immediately. If this was really happening, Ace was bent on doing it on his own terms.

"Just a moment," he said to the translator, handing the artwork to him. He strolled past the guards and stood in front of the Master. "Thank you so much for everything you did," Ace said with sarcasm. "I hope that teacher will be understanding."

He enjoyed the pale look on Master's face when he suddenly realised that using Ace as a bribe wasn't the best idea but he couldn't take his words back now. Ace bowed to the Master and went to the door. There he turned around and looked at the guest and his escorts, who all looked slightly puzzled.

"Are we going or not?" He asked impatiently.

* * *

**There you go. Do tell me if it's just in my head. I would actually recommend listening to the song (or at least intro) because then you would get a feeling what the city looks like and general population, the clothes, etc.**

**Thanks for reviews, favs and follows.**

**Cya,**  
**~Rhe.**


	12. I'll Thank Garp Later

**Hey!**

**So this is me trying to break the writing block I've had this summer. I think the inspiration is quite visible for this one :D No beta.**

**Rating: T?**

**Song of the drabble: _115_ by _Elena Siegman_.**

* * *

If Ace was ever going to make it out alive he was going to thank Garp and beg on his knees to get accepted into the Space Navy. Thanks to Garp's bullying he was admitted for the test programme called Devil's Fruit. The programme was shut down due to high mortality rate but a number of 'survivors', Ace and Luffy included, did gain special abilities. It was only thanks to his special ability that he was still alive unlike the rest of his crew.

They weren't actually a part of SN but they did a lot of exploring for them. Ace's crew discovered quite a few planets and he even got to name one, at the time uninhabited... Well, more like he got distracted by a call from the old man about the said planet only to find it named 'Meatball' when he looked back at the monitor with an innocent looking younger brother close by. This was part of the reason why Garp bullied them into the programme.

Right now he was the only person alive on the Striker with zero chance of getting out of there for an extremely stupid reason. It all started when they found an abandoned Yautja ship and went to investigate. There were quite a few Hish-qu-Ten warriors among the SN so Ace met a lot of them and even had several Yautja friends. He also was familiar with Hish-qu-Ten relationship with xenomorphs and participated in a hunt or two himself (that's how he made his Yautja friends). What he didn't know was that that abandoned ship was carrying xenomorph eggs for the Annual Hunt.

When they realised what happened on the Yautja ship it was already too late for everyone but Ace. Ripley's case was thoroughly studied during space history lessons at school so everyone knew what to expect. However that knowledge didn't help them much – reality turned out to be much harsher than school materials.

Currently he was trying to fix the beacon to send a warning message out with a grilled xenomorph at his feet. Those jerks already infected him four times before and only thanks to his special ability was he able to avoid having his chest ripped from inside. Soon the xenomorphs realised that he was immune to them (he wouldn't put it that way) and decided to use him for a food source. Neither perspective made him especially happy.

"Hello-hello there! This is the Moby Dick - home of scary pirates, that's us if you don't get it." Suddenly the external communicating system announced with annoyingly cheery voice.

Ace quickly jumped towards the panel, almost falling because in his shock he stepped into the burned carcass.

"Hello, this is Striker and I would like to inform you that this would be the worst idea you've ever had," Ace said, trying to be polite.

"Like we've never heard this one before. Prepare to be boarded!"

"Don't do it, you idiots!" He yelled into the mike. "Whatever you do, DO NOT BOARD THE SHIP!"

"Or what?" The pirate ship responded; in the background Ace could clearly hear loud laughter.

"Or one of you might accidentally bring a xenomorph on your ship. How's that for an inside joke?" Ace snapped.

"Identify yourself," another voice took over, sounding extremely serious.

"Independent captain Ace D. Portgas, this is my ship... Get away from me, you stupid lizard! It's bad enough that you're not edible!" Ace's introduction was suddenly interrupted by another alien that tried to eat him. He quickly torched it and kicked it away, wincing at the smell. And yes, he did try to eat them but, unfortunately for him, the food chain only went one way in this case. "Sorry about that."

"How are you still alive?" The man on the other end asked.

"DF02237," Ace answered and waited for response to see if they knew what he meant.

"DF00000," the man responded after a minute of silence.

"Um... what?" was Ace's brilliant response.

"DF00000," the man repeated.

"Nope, never heard of you," he finally said after a quick check of the Devil Fruit registry.

"And if I said Phoenix, would you have heard of me then, Fire Logia?" The smirk was very clear despite the lack of video.

"Phoenix as in MZMP?" Ace's jaw dropped.

"In flesh. With your ability why haven't you exterminated them already?"

"Easier said than done – I've gone through every inch of this ship that I, mind you, built from scratch and I can't find their nest." He huffed, extremely annoyed – he knew Striker inside and out and it bugged him to no end that he didn't know where they were.

"Me and DF05698 will board the ship and investigate."

"Ooooh, shiny!" Ace snorted; it seemed like the whole ship laughed on the other end. "Be my guests."

It took the pirates about half an hour to border Striker. For those half an hour Ace was gathering charred skeletons of the aliens and kicked them towards the boarding site. In the end he had five but he wasn't about to take apart the fences around the kitchen and food storage.

Once on the boarding site he waited patiently for the pirates to come over – it pained him to admit it but the destruction of the Striker was the only option. He would then have to report this incident both to the SN and to the Hish-qu-Ten but first he had to convince the pirates to let him leave his ship.

* * *

**Thanks for all the reviews, favs and follows!**

**Hope to see you sooner rather than later :D**

**~Rhe.**


	13. Rise From The Dark

**Hello :)**

**I actually come with some good news for once - ch.15 of my most anticipated fic only needs beta's seal of approval :D Shouldn't be long now:D **

**Rating: T for a tiny bit of blood and gore**

**Song of the drabble: _Beauty of Annahilation_ by _Elena Siegman_.**

* * *

The operation wasn't going according to the plan, to put it mildly. They were in way, way over their heads and Marco could only hope that at least someone came out alive to warn others. It started when he and Izou was sent on a normal inspection to check the competence of hunters in a town two days away from the headquarters. The reason for that was that there were quite a few causalities recently and the headquarters wanted to assess the situation. Then came intel about a fledgeling nightstrider came and Marco thought it would be a nice test for the hunters in that town.

The fledgeling supposedly hid in an old abandoned cathedral ('how very sarcastic of him' Marco thought since according to superstitions nightstriders were supposed to be afraid of any type of church). They were only going to watch the operation from outside, noting the teamwork, strength or handling of an emergency if it happened. The time was set to two in the afternoon to be on the safe side, which Marco completely approved.

It started out fine – five chanters took their positions around the church and set a level three barrier. Izou just rolled his eyes at that and Marco fully agreed – level three was overdoing it for a mere fledgeling. Level one should have been more than enough. One hunter remained with the communicator outside and two walked into the cathedral – the hunters were doing everything by the textbook.

In retrospect, Marco knew the exact moment everything went to hell, he just didn't pay enough attention at the time – too busy reading a book, while Izou was laying out cards to see the outcome. He ignored the sudden strong wind and the dark clouds that came out of nowhere until it became so dark he couldn't read anymore. The sky was pitch black above the cathedral – it was then he realised it, at the same time as the communicator collapsed clutching her head, indicating that both hunters inside were most likely dead.

"Izou, lets go," Marco rose, leaving his book behind. "Communicator, can you still work?"

"Ye... yes, sir," the woman straightened out, although still visibly unwell.

"Tune in with us – we're going in. Raise shields to level seven." Marco gave out orders as he walked towards the cathedral. "A fledgeling doesn't have this kind of power. Your sources need to be checked."

"How old do you think he is?" Izou asked, his hands automatically forming seals of protection.

"At least three hundred," he answered thoughtfully, halting before the door. "For him to affect weather like this, he must be one of the old ones. Probably just turned young – that's why they thought it was a fledgeling. Are you done?"

"Yes, let's go," Izou nodded and pushed the door open.

They were met by swirling darkness that moved aside to let them walk in and closed the door behind them. Izou looked at Marco with concern – the nightstrider was definitely way older than three hundred. The only way he wasn't that old was if he was a pure blooded nightstrider and not a turned one, but nowadays finding a pure blooded nightstrider was like finding a needle in a mountain of metal scraps.

"You jerks get more and more rude every single time I run into you!" A young voice rang through the cathedral angrily. "I was just minding my own business, taking a break during my travels! I didn't even maul anyone if you don't count those two idiots! A silver blade through the heart is not breakfast in bed done right!"

'You can't really blame him, can you?' Izou said through the communicator. 'I mean, if I was woken up like that – the town would have already been in ruins.'

"Thank you! That's very understanding of you," the creature exclaimed, making Marco go cold.

'Level ten shields,' he thought to the communicator, well aware that the nightstrider knew about it.

"As you wish, it's not like they're going to do anything to hold me," the nightstrider sounded amused.

The darkness was retreating until it was focused around the figure by the altar. At the figure's feet were the mangled bodies of the two hunters that were unfortunate to wake the creature. Through the windows Marco could see that the sky was clearing up until there wasn't a cloud in sight and the sun shone through the windows, illuminating the dark figure by the altar. In a moment the darkness disappeared and they could see the nightstrider.

He turned out to look as a good-looking young man in his early twenties with black hair and pitch black eyes that turned silvery grey as soon as he put his face up to the sun. For a moment the blond was paralysed in sheer panic – they seemed to have found the proverbial needle in a mountain of metal scraps. The nightstrider smiled at them with a surprisingly warm smile on blood-stained lips.

"I do not want to hurt you," he said, taking a step in their direction.

"How old are you?" Marco asked, tracking every movement.

"Twenty one," the creature answered, taking another step.

"I meant your real age," the blond said, fully aware that even if he said to the man to stay away, he didn't have any power here to enforce it.

"How old do you think I am?" the nightstrider stopped and sat down on one of the first row benches, turning to face them.

"Two hundred?" Izou blurted out, making Marco roll his eyes – his brother never was good at guessing the age of nightstriders.

"Seriously? I look like a two hundred years old grandpa?" The sheer disbelief and outrage to Izou's guess made Marco chuckle, thinking that if the creature in front of them wasn't indeed twenty one, then he was a damn good actor.

"What, you mean you're older?" The blond decided to test the waters.

"Hey! Do I sit here insulting you, you stupid pineapple?!" The nightstrider exclaimed angrily; an instant follow up to that was roll of thunder outside. The creature immediately clasped a hand over his mouth, looking at the windows warily, as if expecting more weather anomalies. "Sorry, I still have troubles with controlling my powers."

"Marco, what do we do?" Izou hissed quietly; the nightstrider pretended he didn't hear anything. "We can't fight him – he'll just pulverise us."

The creature opened his mouth to probably deny it but closed it again and pretended to examine the ceiling after receiving a stern glare and a raised eyebrow from Marco.

"We'll take him with us and let Pops decide," the blond finally answered.

"Are you out of your chicken mind?!" Izou shouted.

The nightstrider raised his hand to get their attention and said:

"I agree with the lady – it's not a logical choice, it's sabotage."

"Who the hell is a lady?!" Izou growled at the creature but turned back to Marco immediately. "You want to bring him to the headquarters so that he could wipe it out and make every single nightstrider out there sing him praises three times a day?! Not to mention how are you planning to _make him_ go with us?!"

"You'll come with us, right?" Marco asked the creature.

"Is he always like this?" the creature asked in disbelief.

"Not really, no..." Izou answered slowly, still in shock. "He's normally normal... as much as it can be expected of him..."

"So? Are you coming?"

"If only to make sure the lady commits you to a mental institution," the creature answered as he stood up and picked up a bag from another bench.

* * *

**This fic had multiple inspirations but it still didn't turn out to be what I thought it would turn out to be. It just ran away from me... Anyway, nightstriders are your basic vamps, I just didn't want call them vamps plus in my fantasy it came from the language of the vamps where they are called literally 'those who move swiftly in the night'.**

**Thanks for all the reviews, favs and follows!**

**Now I do know that I will see you guys soon,**

**~Rhe.**


	14. Detached But Bound

**Hello!**

**I just realized I had to write something for Marco's Bday so here it is :D Had to search through all my drabble ideas before I found this one :D Not the happiest drabble but it's not the saddest one either XD Ofc no beta :D**

**Rating: T+**

**Song of the drabble: _Sweet Curse_ by_ ReVamp_.**

* * *

Marco was tired. He was too tired of living, dying and living again. The envy he felt for the humans that could end their suffering with one simple movement, be it stepping in front of a train or pulling the trigger... On the other hand they didn't betray their lover to his death seven thousand years ago. Well, maybe some humans did do that, but Marco was willing to bet his not very small (to put it mildly) fortune that their lovers weren't most powerful shamans of their time.

So here he was, wandering the night city and trying to find a way to ease his boredom. There wasn't a thing in this world that Marco didn't try to kill his boredom. Eventually he just gave up on everything and the reason he had a job and walked around at night was because it was better than just lying in his bed. The internet did help for a while but there weren't enough series and cat pictures to keep him interested. He was quite fond of gaming though – more often than not it helped him to pass the time.

There was a reason why he wasn't at home playing Heroes of Might and Magic III or doing dungeons in any of his multiple MMORPGs. Everything circled back to the shaman that cursed him. To lift the curse he needed the shaman's forgiveness. To get that forgiveness he needed to find the reincarnated shaman (which was a lot easier now with internet but still too close to impossible). Marco had no idea what the shaman would look like or even if he was going to be reincarnated as a man.

He still remembered that day like it was yesterday,despite all the millennia. He remembered the curse, word for word, as the shaman forced it out with his dying breath - 'Whatever life left in me... with it I curse you... I curse you to wander alone for eternity... you will never find rest until I forgive you...'

Marco didn't betray him willingly or knowingly – he loved him too much to do that but he wasn't a shaman so he couldn't protect himself when another shaman decided to kill his lover with Marco's own hands. He could see and understand everything he did and said but he couldn't control his body in the slightest. He couldn't stop himself from brutally murdering his love... Of course the shaman that made him do it was long dead, Marco personally saw to it, but that didn't revive his love. Hell, he couldn't even remember his lover's name! Well, he couldn't remember his own name either so maybe it wasn't such a big deal.

Finally deciding to call it a day and go home, Marco went to the closest bus stop. He sat down on the bench leaning back tiredly and closing his eyes. There was at least half an hour before his bus would arrive, possibly even enough for a nap. Marco sighed, listening to another late passenger walk towards him to check the schedule and back away to stand by the stop sign.

"You look horrible," the man said to Marco.

"I'm just tired," the blond decided to humour the man by answering.

"How long has it been, Marokh?" the man asked.

"Seven thousand years, give or take a couple of centuries," Marco answered with a sigh but without thinking. He was too tired to think.

"That's... a bit longer than I expected... It seems like every time I was born I missed you by a couple of months. If you just stayed in places a little bit longer this could have stopped a long time ago..."

"How long?"

"I think the first time I was reborn was in Thebes during the reign of Djer but when I was five you ran off to China. I remember seeing you often in the marketplace – I just didn't know why you looked so familiar back then." The man answered.

Marco's brain started catching up slowly. He opened his eyes and looked at the man by the stop sign. The resemblance was striking. In fact, if he wasn't sitting on a bench in a city made of asphalt, steel and plastic, he would have thought he travelled back in time. Everything was the same, down to the last freckle.

"Assei?" Marco breathed, afraid that this was another hallucination.

"I'm Ace now, the ever broke and ever hungry student," the shaman gave a small smile, looking pained and relieved at the same time. "I finally caught up to you."

"What do you mean, caught up to me?" Marco breathed, getting up and taking a shaky step towards Ace.

"Ever since I missed you at the construction of Lion Gate in Mycenae I've been using my powers to predict your movements and redirect my rebirth. I never managed to catch up to you before my time ran out..."

"Why?" the blond took another step.

"I may have been hurt and betrayed and died at the hand of the sole reason for my existence but I never intended for this to happen. I would never willingly do _this_ to you... but I did. For that I am sorry and I forgive you. You don't need to suffer anymore."

"So if I just jump in front of a bus right now I will die?" Marco asked, moving one step closer.

"Yes." Ace answered, looking him directly in the eyes. The blond was surprised by the expression on the shaman's face. Assei was never good at lying despite being a shaman – his face always gave him up and despite the time Marco still knew his every expression. Right now he looked sad, guilty, in pain and relieved but more than anything else he looked lost.

"What if I want revenge?" The blond said, carefully observing Ace's face.

"I can teach you what curses I know if that is what you want," the shaman answered with hoarse voice, looking away.

"What do_ you_ want?"

"I want what I always wanted. That one never changed..."

"You mean you're hungry?" Marco couldn't do this anymore, not when Assei looked like a kicked puppy. He missed him too damn much to walk away out of spite.

"Wha..." Ace looked like a fish out of water for a moment before he, like Marco predicted, became hilariously angry. "Jerk! I hate you! Seven thousand years and you're the same jerk you were back then!"

"So you're not hungry?" The blond raised his eyebrow and, just as expected, Assei's stomach rumbled.

"Shut up! I hate you!" Ace shouted, red in the face.

Marco could barely hold his laughter in – Assei hasn't changed one bit.

"That's too bad. I know a good restaurant that's still open at this hour – I thought you could keep me company."

Ace looked anywhere but at him, blushing furiously. The blond finally let a chuckle out – the shaman was always too stubborn and hot-headed for his own good.

"Come here," Marco said with a smile that was getting bigger by the second, bracing himself. Cue pouncing in three... two... one... "Umph!" He grunted when he got an armful of Ace. Marco hugged him back, feeling more alive than he could ever remember. Finally, finally it was over.

* * *

**See? A happy ending :D**

**Thanks for the reviews, favs and follows!**

**Hope to see you sooner rather than later,**

**~Rhe.**


	15. Worth The Wait

**Hm... In the last couple of weeks I updated more than the last half a year... Well, what can I say, if inspiration hits me at ten in the evening - I write. **

**Rating: K**

**Song of the drabble: _Love Life_ by _John Mamann ft Kika_**

* * *

To say that Marco was nervous was to say nothing. Nervous wasn't even beginning to cover it. Everything started with that stupid dating website that Izou registered him for. It was different from others because it was impossible to post a picture of yourself there. All in all Marco liked the concept of it being not about appearance but about what was inside. Still, a lot of people cheated by immediately exchanging Facebook or any other social media info. It was on that website that Marco met Ace.

Since Ace's profile came up in suggestions, Marco checked it out and he liked the overall impression but then he saw that he was two age brackets below Marco. With a sigh and a shrug the blond moved on to other profiles and thought it to be the end of it. Boy, was he wrong! Approximately three hours later he received a message from Ace and, feeling curious enough, Marco responded.

A conversation turned into two, five, ten, then they exchanged phone numbers spending most of their free time talking to each other. All the while Ace stuck to the rules of the website, refusing to send Marco his picture or to allow the blond to send one of himself. The reason he provided was that he didn't want to be judged based upon his looks which, apparently, happened a lot to him. Somehow Marco's mind went to any possible bad thing that could have had anything to do with Ace's appearance like, for example, maybe he was badly scarred after an accident or something along those lines. Ace assured him that it wasn't the case but Marco was having hard time believing it.

By that time he knew very well that the website served its purpose – the blond was completely smitten with Ace's personality; he didn't give a damn about his looks. Still, Marco was quite apprehensive, dialling his number, because somehow he felt that Ace didn't really trust him.

"Hey, Marco," Ace answered after a few tones; even if the blond never saw Ace, he knew that the younger man was smiling right now. "How was work?"

"Fine," he replied, feeling his nerves twist in his abdomen.

"You don't sound fine. What's up?"

"Um... Today I found out that I have to go to a conference in your city..." Marco said, biting his lip nervously.

"Oh... Are... are you calling to ask if we could meet up?" Ace sounded just as nervous on the other side of the line.

"You don't have to if you don't feel like it... I mean, it's not until the end of next month, you have plenty of time to decide..." Marco said quickly.

"No, I want to meet you," Ace answered just a quickly. "How long is the conference?"

"It's from the 27th to 30th... Friday through Monday... We going to talk business on Friday and Monday and then we have some activities planned for the weekend to get to know the people from that branch... I'm rambling, aren't I?"

"Yeah, you are," Ace chuckled. "It's a date. Tell me when you find out the times so that I could give you a private tour of the city."

"Sure thing," Marco couldn't help but grin. "Now, with that out of the way, how was your day?"

Of course Marco was nervous back then, but it was nothing compared to what he felt right now. At the moment he was very close to panic – the conference was dragging on longer than they said it would and he had just sent Ace a quick text that he'd be late for at the very least an hour. He received a cheery text back, saying that Ace'd use the time to work on writing the programme for a class he had.

He could barely sit still when the conference was finally finishing up, all but bolting out after they decided the gathering time for the Saturday activities. He swiftly ran up the stairs to his room, deeming elevators not fast enough, to change out of his monkey suit. There was no way in hell that he was going to meet Ace for the first time wearing his stupid bland grey suit. For that very purpose he had a set of clothes selected by Izou. He had to suffer through a lot before Izou finally deemed anything good enough, forcing Marco to buy clothes that were more expensive than he was used to buying. Thankfully it only consisted of a long-sleeved blue t-shirt (that Marco swore he could buy for a lesser price in another store but there was no arguing with his brother) and a pair of jeans that were worth every penny (at least according to Izou).

After changing, Marco rushed out of the hotel to go to the café around the corner where Ace was supposed to wait for him. All he knew was that Ace had dark hair, a red leather jacket and would be sitting with a laptop. Walking into a pretty crowded café Marco would have never thought that he'd be facing the following dilemma. In a corner of that café sat two guys that almost mirrored each other's movements, sitting in opposite tables – one by the window, the other one by the wall, - both typing something on their laptops, both dark haired and yes, both had a red leather jacket hanging from the backs of their chairs.

The guy by the window was better looking by far – his body was obviously better built (judging by how well he filled out his faded (but by no means old) green t-shirt) and even if he was looking down at the laptop with a frown, Marco could still see he was handsome. The other guy was slimmer, wore a blue striped dress shirt and checked his phone twice while Marco stood there in contemplation.

While the blond stood there, trying to decide who to approach (and how embarrassing it'd be if he got it wrong), the guy in a dress shirt looked up, smiled at Marco and got up. Marco stood, paralysed, as he tried to stomp down the disappointment that it wasn't the other guy and force a smile on his face, when a girl walked pass him towards the standing guy, greeting him with a kiss on the cheek. Seeing as the guy didn't even look at Marco as he pulled out a chair for the girl, the blond released a breath he didn't know he was holding.

The guy in a green t-shirt was extremely concentrated on whatever he was doing on the computer, his muttering to himself was inaudible in the crowded café until Marco came closer.

"What if we move this part here? Hm... And delete this part and restart the whole thing?" The muttering was accompanied by quick typing; the blond took a calming breath – he'd recognise this voice anywhere. "Son of a ..!" Ace angrily slammed his laptop shut. He closed his eyes, rubbing them as he leaned back in his chair. In a moment he reached for the phone next to the laptop and opened his eyes to check the phone. Only then did he notice Marco standing next to the table.

Ace's eyes slowly trailed up Marco's body, taking in the sight, finally stopping at his face. The blond gave a slight nervous smile – Ace was even hotter up close, why he refused to send his photo was beyond Marco's understanding.

"Sorry I'm late," he finally said.

Ace took his time responding, leisurely checking him out again, before a sly expression made its way onto his face and he responded:

"You are worth waiting for."

* * *

**Somehow I feel that with each and every... anything I write Marco gets more and more ooc XD **

**Anyhow, thanks for all the reviews, favs and follows :D**

**Hope to see you sooner rather than later,**

**~Rhe.**

**PS: I feel like those last three lines are becoming my signature phrase XD (or already are)**


	16. Dial M for Motivation

**Two in the morning and what am I doing? Writing random stuff because I have no inspiration for any of my fics. This drabble has information from _Criminology Research Focus_ by _Karen T. Froeling_. This is not as (probably) unexpected as it might seem since I actually like crime shows (like Criminal Minds or Stalker). **

**Rating: T/M for mentioning criminals (which could lead to researching them and their crimes) and mentionings of modus operandi.**

**Song of the drabble: _Murder_ by _Within Temptation_.**

* * *

One of the courses Ace decided to take this year was criminal history – a subject that went through famous killers, why they did it and how they did it. Since he was aiming to get a degree in psychology it was a wise choice. A lot of other people thought like that as well, meaning the course was first come - first served. Ace barely believed his luck when his student ID number showed up on the list of thirty students taking the course.

That alone made his day – the number of students applying for the course was more than eighty. First thing he did was to run and buy the recommended literature but was quickly brought back to his senses after seeing the price. Thankfully, he knew a person who knew a person who had the book in pdf. Lucky for him the person didn't ask for money so he was one of the few who actually read the book before the first lecture.

He was busy rereading his notes when he heard the professor calling for attention but when he looked up he knew one thing for sure. Had this been a bar – Ace would have immediately walked over to introduce himself. If this was a café – he would have paid for whatever the man was ordering. If this was a bus he would have found any possible way to start a conversation. Unfortunately (or fortunately) this was none of preferred alternatives. This was a class, he was a student and the man he just most definitely drooled over was his teacher.

"Good morning, everyone. My name is Marco Jenkins and I'll be the one making sure you know which mistakes will get you arrested," the teacher said once the class quieted down. "We will go through such, for a lack of a better word, classics as Son of Sam, Green River Killer, the Butcher of Rostov, Milwaukee Cannibal and BTK. Who can tell me what they all have in common? Besides being killers, of course."

Ace felt his hand raising before he could actually come up with an answer.

"Yes, third row, red hoodie. Your name?"

"Ace Portgas," he officially had all of five seconds to come up with a reasonable answer while the teacher checked the list of students.

"Yes, there you are. So, tell us – what do they all have in common?"

"They are all male?" Ace went for the obvious answer.

"So very true." The professor nodded, walking to stand in frond of the teacher's desk and then moving to sit on it. "According to Radford University, statistically over the last century 90.8 % of all known serial killers were male. So our first lecture we'll spend talking about the remaining 9.2%, namely female serial killers. Who can name a female serial killer? Yes, mister Portgas?"

"Black Widows of Liverpool?"

"You are correct but I was going for a more obvious one."

"The countess?"

"Yes, her. Now, who, besides you, mister Portgas, can tell me about the countess?"

The room was quiet. Ace could barely believe it – the question was like asking who George Washington was. Furthermore, she was mentioned literally in the first paragraph of the book recommended for the course and once during the lecture of criminal psychology.

"Seriously? No one? It's not like I'm asking about a way to achieve cold fusion. Mister Portgas, could you help your class remember?"

Ace didn't need another excuse to focus the attention of the teacher on him. Mentally thanking his interest in criminology and the person who gave him the book, he answered the question:

"Countess Elizabeth Batory lived in Hungary during late 16th century and is the most prolific female serial killer. Official number of her victims is 80 but according to legends the number is around 650."

"Thank you, mister Portgas. Now, I know this is a short course but I expect you people to come prepared and if you have read the syllabus you know that active participation in classes is required for a passing grade. Most teachers don't really enforce the rule but I am not most teachers."

"The literature is super expensive!" One student complained and, in privacy of his own head Ace absolutely agreed with them.

"Mister Portgas, have you read the book?"

"Yes," Ace nodded, feeling like the whole class was about to murder him and make sure he was never found.

"And how did you get it?"

"Connections and a bribe," he answered. The feeling of people wanting to kill him was intensifying.

"Fair enough. I would like the class to follow mister Portgas' example and be prepared for the next class. Now that we have a face in our minds, please tell me how are female serial killers different from male?" The teacher made a gesture towards Ace, inviting him to speak.

"In general they tend to choose a target weaker than themselves, their crimes are rarely sexual in nature – they prefer sneaky methods, like poison or lethal injection, they have longer cooling-off periods and generally have a longer 'career' than men."

"Indeed. The typologies for male serial killers are not enough because of the different MO. There is also a difference depending on whether those women act alone or in a partnership with another. Because of that, six new categories appeared – the black widow, the angel of death, revenge killer, profit or crime killer, team killer and the sexual predator. You must have heard of those before, so could anyone, besides mister Portgas, remind us?"

When the class was over Ace was actually packing his things with a sense of a job well done – he definitely made the teacher remember his name and managed for once to leave a good impression.

"Mister Portgas, can I have a word with you?" The teacher asked when Ace got up from his seat.

Caught by surprise, Ace stumbled but regained his balance. He slowly walked down, trying not to look too happy about this, but the question caught him completely off guard.

"Do you happen to know someone called Robin Nico?" The teacher asked, intently studying Ace's face.

"Why?"

"Lets say the word 'bribe' raises some flags in my mind."

"Um, yeah. She's friends with my brother and he said if it's book related she definitely can help." Ace answered, not sure where this was going.

"That explains a lot. I hope you'll be happy to learn that the pdf book you have most likely came from my computer," the teacher said with a smile as he looked at Ace's shocked face. "Still, book or not, you were well prepared for class and for that I would actually like to thank you. Nothing makes a teacher's job more depressing than asking a question and receiving dead silence in return."

"It's no big deal, I find the subject very interesting," Ace mumbled, trying and failing to look and sound cool.

"I want you to keep up the good job – it'll make me look forward to at least one of my classes," the teacher smiled again and Ace couldn't help but think that this was motivation at its best – he was so going to memorize the stolen copy word for word before the next class.

* * *

**There we go. Too much focus on the dialog, anyone?**

**Thanks for all the reviews, favs and follows.**

**Hope to see you sooner rather than later,**

**~Rhe.**


	17. Next Time Lead With That

**Wow, you guys... My laptop died and I drowned my phone and all that happened within two weeks back in late November... I have never been more thankful for dropbox than back then. Anyhow, Happy New Year! I figured I had to write something since it's Ace's B-day. This one is heavily inspired by tv show called Sleepy Hollow.**

**Rated: K+/T for language**

**Song of the drabble: _Inside The Fire_ by _Disturbed_.**

* * *

Marco was getting tired of this. Seriously, how hard could it be to find a warlock in 2016? Apparently extremely hard – every single one he met was a hoax. He could read taro cards or throw some runes himself, thank you very much. What he needed was a real warlock with real powers. Unfortunately for him warlocks weren't listed in yellow pages... at least not real ones. That was exactly why he was standing in front of a door that said 'A. Portgas – Private Investigator'. After a lot of asking around, digging and following an enormous amount of leads Marco finally learned that if there was something strange or even occult one could turn to this A. Portgas.

He carefully knocked on the door, part of him hoping no one was home. The door cracked open at the knock so Marco took it as a sign to walk in.

"Hello?" He called, closing the door after himself.

What greeted him and almost gave him a heart attack was a coat hanger in form of a skeleton. Marco could swear the skeleton was looking at him even if he had no eyes to look with. Its arms were outstretched, waiting for a jacket or a coat to be placed on them.

"No thanks, I'm fine," the blond said to the skeleton.

Marco proceeded farther towards the office, feeling the skeleton's eyes on his back. This could be the place... or he could simply be paranoid. He shook his head and opened the door at the end of the short corridor.

"Hello?" He called again, peeking into the office to see if there were more skeletons around. What he saw was a man half lying in his chair with his feet planted on the desk and his face covered by a blinding orange cowboy hat. "Excuse me, the door was open..."

"Hm?" The man sounded as if he just woke up.

"I heard that here I could find some help if I had some unusual problems," Marco said carefully.

"Define unusual," the man said, settling more comfortably into his chair.

"Unnatural... even supernatural..." The blond elaborated.

"Please sit," the man said, taking his hat off and putting his feet down. He pointed to a chair in front of the desk. "Would you like something to drink, tea or coffee?"

"Coffee would be great," Marco answered as he settled into the chair.

"Brook, two cups of coffee, please!" The man called.

The blond turned around to see if he missed a person (which wasn't good since he took pride in being very observant) only to see the skeleton that greeted him walk over to the coffee machine in the corner of the office.

"So, what's this unnatural problem you were talking about?" The man brought attention back to himself since Marco kept staring at the skeleton with an open mouth.

"Wha..? Right, problem... Are you a necromancer?" The blond forced himself to look away from Brook.

"I dabbled in it a little a couple of centuries ago," the man waved his hand dismissively; he sure as hell didn't look that old – if anything he looked younger than he supposed to thanks to his freckles. "I can do basically any type of magic with a grimoire though my speciality is fire magic. Please tell me you want me to blow something up – I haven't done it in ages."

"I don't really know what magic we need..." Marco said thoughtfully.

"Could you describe your problem?"

"Right, I should probably start with that." The blond nodded. "It's an unusual problem even for the supernatural realm... thank you." He nodded again, this time to the skeleton that brought him coffee. "It's also a very dangerous problem so I would understand if you said no."

"Could you move to the point a little faster?" A. Portgas took a sip from his cup of coffee.

"It's about riders. So far there are two of them – one on a white horse and another on red. Two more will soon follow – one on a black horse and one on pale horse. I'd like your help in stopping the ones that are already here and preventing the ones that will come," Marco said, reaching for his cup.

"Oh really? I felt something brewing but I had no idea it was this big... Very, very interesting. What are your terms?"

"You mean you will help us?"

"Lucky for you I helped a little last time these guys went out to party so I have some idea as to how to put them back to sleep. I want to know what you're offering in exchange for my help."

"What do you want? We'd give a lot to have a real warlock on our side. Especially since those guys have one helping them out."

"I want any magical artefacts we might come across as well as a symbolic sum of money... Wait. Who's helping them?"

"It's a strong warlock with power over darkness. He calls himself..."

"Teach!" The warlock growled with an evil glint in his eyes; his coffee boiled in his cup. "You should have led with that! I claim any magical artefacts we acquire together and get to pulverise that piece of shit and we have a deal."

"That's it?" Marco asked uncertainly, refusing to believe his luck.

"You can sign a blood contract if you wish but you can just trust that if you don't hold your end of the bargain I'll come after you. I know some extremely uncomfortable curses I'm sure you don't want to experience."

"Can I ask why you hate him?"

"You mean you like him?"

"No, but..."

"If you must know - that douchebag sent me to purgatory. I spent there one hundred and fifty nine extremely uncomfortable years and I would very much like to repay him with interest. If you are done with your questions I suggest we get going." The warlock got out of his chair. "Brook, lock the door and stand guard. If Luffy or Sabo comes by tell them I went to settle a score."

"We're leaving? You don't have to pack anything?" Marco asked, confused.

"Think about a safe place close to where the horsemen started the party," A. Portgas said, putting his hand on Marco's shoulder and the next second the blond was staring at Pops and the rest back in their lair under the Moby Dick Café. "Hi, I'm Ace the warlock. Where's that pie eating a-hole?"

* * *

**Well, something along those lines. Thanks for, well, everything! Despite the fact that I update not very often I get a lot of positive feedback and a lot of support from the community here and it means a lot to me. I hope we can continue this relationship even this year :D **

**Hope to see you sooner rather than later,**

**~Rhe.**


	18. Perks Of Persistance

**Sup :D**

**I don't really remember where this one came from, only that I've been sort of laughing on and off every time I remembered it. **

**Rating: K+/T because of language.**

**Song of the drabble: _Destination Nowhere_ by Erika Sawajiri_._**

* * *

Marco stirred slightly, waking up with a familiar feeling of a hot (in every sense of the word) body sprawled almost all the way on top of him. His movements didn't go unnoticed, causing the man in his arms shift to his left. Now, instead of covering two thirds of the blond, the dark haired man covered only half. Marco smiled sluggishly, pressing his lips to the unruly mop of dark hair. He's known Ace for six years, been together for five and a half and he still couldn't get over the giddiness that came with having the man in his arms.

Heck, he still couldn't get over how they first met. Well, technically it wasn't their first meeting, but they only met briefly once approximately fifteen years prior to that, so it could just as well be their first meeting. Though, without the initial meeting they probably would not have met at all...

That meeting happened when Marco was walking to his afternoon classes at the university he was attending. The path took him over a bridge and so he was walking, trying to remember if he locked the door when he left. Several meters in front of him was walking an old-ish lady with huge bags and a few steps behind her was kid, his nose in a book. Suddenly a man on a bicycle, coming from the other direction, swerved, almost hitting the woman, who in turn jumped away, not noticing how one of her huge bags pushed the kid into the hole in the fence that happened to be exactly where the kid was.

The kid didn't even scream, clearly not understanding what happened, as he plummeted into the river below. Marco didn't think twice, dropping his bags and jumping after the kid. Luckily the river wasn't very fast, though deep enough to be dangerous to those who couldn't swim. It didn't take the blond long to catch up to the kid, grab him and start dragging him to the shore. The kid didn't try to flail or make Marco's job any harder, only stared at him with shocked grey eyes. Soon enough they were on the shore, slumped on the grass – adrenalin all but gone.

"You alright?" Marco panted, turning his head to look at the kid.

"Thank you..." The kid panted back after nodding. "Are you going to marry me now?"

"What?" The blond's jaw dropped – he did not expect this.

"In stories the hero always marries the one they save," the kid said seriously.

"Oh... You're a bit too young to get married, don't you think?" Marco chuckled. "Find me again in fifteen years and then we'll talk."

The kid nodded solemnly but, before he could say anything else, a bunch of people appeared almost out of nowhere, asking them if they were fine, praising Marco and being angry at the man on the bicycle and the woman with her huge bags.

The blond never really dwelt on what happened, and he most definitely forgot about what he said to the kid... until roughly fifteen years later a young man with unruly black hair and piercing grey eyes showed up on his doorstep.

"How can I help you?" Marco asked after the pause was starting to get awkward since the young man just stared at him.

"I am looking for Marco Jenkins?" The young man finally snapped back to reality.

"You found him, how can I help you?" The blond asked again, hoping this wasn't another one of the religious cults. Those seemed to take a liking to him, bothering him almost every week.

"Hi... my name is Ace Portgas," the man said with a small smile, his hands twisting the hem of his t-shirt nervously.

"And?" Marco asked impatiently, hearing someone walking up the stairs a few floors below.

"You promised to marry me," the young man said with a serious face.

"What the..." The blond blanched. "Cut the bullshit! I've never seen you before in my life!"

"I thought you might not recognise me so I brought this with me," the man reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out what looked like a newspaper clipping.

The article was called 'The Unknown Hero' and it described what happened fifteen years ago on that bridge with a call to the 'hero' to step forward because the parents wanted to thank him personally. There was a picture of both the kid and the river attached, making Marco remember the short conversation on the riverbank. He looked up in horror, only to lock eyes with his neighbour from above.

"Get inside," he hissed to the young man – he was not going to argue about this outside his door for all his neighbours to hear.

The grown kid happily obliged, walking past him into his apartment. He briefly stopped to take off his shoes and shrug off his backpack and then turned to face Marco. The blond locked the door with gritted teeth and went to the kitchen; the kid followed.

"Sit," Marco growled, pointing at one of the chairs, not bothering to offer the kid anything to drink. "Listen here, kid..."

"Ace. My name is Ace," the kid interrupted.

"Listen here, _Ace_, I am not going to marry you, I was never going to marry you and you can just get this stupid idea out of your head."

"But you promised..." The kid made a shocked face.

"I was kidding."

"I don't care, you said you were going to marry me and I won't let you back out of it."

"I didn't mean it! That was a joke! Do you know what joke is?" Marco was slowly starting to panic – Ace seemed dead set on putting the ring on him. It's not like was against marriage or wasn't into guys, but when cornered like this he was very much against it.

"I am well aware of what a joke is," the kid frowned. "You told me to find you in fifteen years and I accepted it. I waited that long and you are not backing out of it. Fifteen years was long enough for you to run around and date other people but this is it. We are going to get married and it's not up for discussion."

"I am not marrying you and THAT is not up for discussion! I will never marry you! I don't know you and I don't want to know you!" Marco yelled, one step from hyperventilation.

Ace's lower lip trembled and he slumped over the table, hiding his face in his arms. The blond froze, watching the kid's shaking frame. He had never made anyone cry before and he had never seen a guy being driven to tears, which made the situation about a thousand times worse. He felt like a cold-hearted jerk – after all he could have calmly explained everything to the kid, apologised for misleading him instead of just yelling at him.

Meanwhile Ace, still shaking, slid down the table with sobs and curled on the floor, making the blond feel even more like an ass. People were different and if Ace was a bit more sensitive then yelling at him was the worst thing Marco could have done. He finally jerked out of his stupor and made his way to the young man on the floor.

"Hey... I'm really sorry, I should not have yelled," he said sheepishly, carefully putting his hand on Ace's shaking back.

Ace lifted his head to look at him, tears in his eyes, before hiding his face again, only this time his right hand was banging on the floor. He made a pained noise, making Marco flinch, that grew louder and louder until it broke into a MASSIVE laugh. The kid fell on his side, holding his stomach, and laughed and laughed and laughed. From time to time he'd take a look at the blond's dumbfounded face, before laughing even harder.

"Fuck..." Ace wheezed between laughs. "Man, you should have seen your face... It was fucking priceless..."

Marco felt his lips twitch and soon he was also laughing so hard his stomach hurt. After all he probably would have done the same thing if their positions were reversed. It took them a long time to calm down and return to the table, this time Marco was kind enough to offer Ace some coffee. Soon after Ace explained that this prank was a spur of the moment kind of thing – in reality he came here to properly thank Marco. As it turned out he wasted quite a lot of money on a private investigator to find Marco only to realise that all he had to do was go to the apartment complex next to his.

The blond chuckled at the memory, tightening his hold around Ace. His lover made a content sound at that, pressing his lips to Marco's neck.

"What's so funny so early in the morning?" Ace murmured, snuggling closer to the blond.

"Just remembering when you showed up on my doorstep, demanding to marry you," he answered with a smile.

"I still can't believe you fell for that," Ace chuckled as well. "I wish I had a camera so you could see your face."

"You're not the only one – any one of my brothers would chop their arm off to see that," Marco snorted.

"Still... I got what I wanted, didn't I?" Ace smiled as he found Marco's left hand with his own and intertwined their fingers. "I just hope you didn't make any more promises like that, though I'm sure that being haseki sultan would have it's perks."

"Only you would think that," Marco laughed.

* * *

**I have a question I want to ask. Is the fanfiction ship sinking or what? Why is everyone going over to AO3? What's so good about it? I'm seriously curious. Should I get an account there as well?**

**Thanks for all the reviews, favs and follows,**

**~Rhe.**


	19. Blood Obligation

**Hello ^-^**

**I guess I survived the exams, though this drabble thoroughly depicts how I feel now X'D When you read it, you probably will be confused so there will be some explanations in the end. **

**Rating: T/M for violence and blood and gore **

**Song of the drabble: _Silver For The Monsters_ by _Marcin Przybyłowicz_ for_ Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt_**

* * *

Ace hasn't been this nervous since he was first led into the room with other children to test if he could be a link to any of Whitebeard's striges. Getting chosen meant that his family would be set for life, never needing anything ever again in exchange for Ace's blood. It was not a bad deal, considering that links often lived almost as long as their strix. His family would be set for many generations forward. Luckily for him, he was accepted and his family soon moved into the Inner City – the part of the city inside the castle walls where artisans and families of other links lived. It was an enormous caste jump for them – from being in the lowest cast they became second only to striges and healers.

Striges were an important part of their society – they were sort of knights, but each worth thousands on the battlefield. Incredibly fast, strong and cunning though that wasn't the most dangerous part of them. They needed links, like Ace, to anchor them through their blood in a cognisant mindset because nothing was more dangerous than a wild strix. A wild strix had no allegiance, no conscience, no remorse and was about as stoppable as a tornado, volcano and an earthquake all wrapped into one. And Ace was about to walk into the den of a now wild strix.

It's been about half a year since an unknown party somehow managed to kidnap Marco, Ace's strix. He honestly didn't know what was worse – the fact that they somehow managed to kidnap the oldest strix under Whitebeard's command or that they failed to control him in the long run. Ace guessed their plan was to first make the blond forget his former life by reducing him to a wild strix and then build him back up, only with a different allegiance. Stupid plan, if anyone asked Ace – any plan that involved a wild strix and no destruction or killing was bound to fail. The only way to deal with a wild strix was to kill it or to send their link in the general direction of their lair and hope the link would survive the initial assault. Once the strix had the link's blood in their system, the link could control them with relative ease (that was if the link lived long enough to do that).

Combine all of the above and Ace thought he deserved some time to freak out, say goodbye to his life and regret the day he entered the castle gates together with other kids in his neighbourhood. That didn't mean he wasn't going to do it – he just needed some private freaking out time. So, after some time to himself, Ace made his way towards the sealed lair guarded by four other striges – they could not risk Marco doing more damage and, judging by the sounds coming from the inside the old crypt, the blond wasn't too happy about that.

'Just perfect – an agitated wild strix,' Ace thought bitterly.

Haruta, one of the striges standing guard, noticed the look on his face.

"Sorry, I guess that's my fault – I tried to put a calming spell on him, just in case, but he didn't like it."

As if to emphasise the words the crypt shook under the heavy blows coming from inside.

"If I'm going to die - it's your fault," Ace snapped.

"Ace, I am truly sorry – I tried to help..." Haruta apologised sincerely.

"Well, tell that to Marco when you'll have to put him down," Ace mumbled under his breath, fully aware that Haruta would still hear him. He moved closer to the entrance and put his hand on the door, trying to feel in which part of the crypt the blond was at the time. "Prepare to send me through on my mark," he said after a calming breath. He just needed Marco to move to the other side of the crypt so that he could have a second to gather his thoughts on the other side of the door.

"Now," he said after a minute and then came the sick feeling of going through the wall. Ace knew he was kidding himself – he wouldn't have second. True enough – as soon as he got to the other side, he was flung across the crypt like a rag doll. Then came a flash of blinding pain and then darkness.

(◐ o ◑ )

Ace had no idea how long he was unconscious but the fact that he was aware now made him incredibly happy. Being aware meant he was alive and being alive, no matter how mangled, meant yay! He tried to assess the situation by focusing on different body parts and he was pleasantly surprised to find that he still had all his limbs attached to him. Not that he wouldn't grow them back eventually (thanks to his connection to Marco) but the process was long and involved a lot of pain and itching.

The next thing he noticed was a warm body, curled up next to his. Ace reached out with his hand to touch the dark blue feathers and was awarded with a loud purring sound. A head appeared in the heap of feathers, staring at Ace with unblinking yellow eyes, the purring growing louder. That was a good sign – if the eyes were still red, Ace would have only lived for as long as the strix wasn't hungry.

"Hhhhh..." He tried to say 'hi' but failed miserably, probably because his throat was still healing. His hand fell to the floor from the feathers and he somehow managed to turn it palm down. Figuring out how much energy he could use without dying to produce a shock big enough to be noticed was a bit out of his mental capabilities at the moment, so he just took what he could gather, leaving some behind to sustain him.

The shock echoed in the crypt, shaking the old ceiling and dislodging a lot of dust and small stones. The strix opened it's mouth, tasting the air with a forked tongue. It then slowly rose and moved to stand above Ace's body – another good sign. They stayed like that for a while, long enough for him to start wondering whether anyone heard him, until the doors slowly opened, shining light into the crypt. The strix above Ace hissed angrily, crouching low and completely obscuring the human beneath it. Unused to the light, the creature was almost blinded and therefore ten times more dangerous.

"What the... damn... Ace? Ace?!" Someone called.

The strix crouched even lower and snarled, unhappy with the intrusion.

"Look, his eyes are yellow!" Another person said urgently.

"Then Ace is alive! Ace, where are you? Give us another sign," a third person added.

Ace barely moved his leg so that his thigh would touch the hind leg of the strix and concentrated the best he could. The strix hissed at the invasion will but could do nothing but oblige and bowed his head to touch Ace's forehead with his. After a moment he made his will go through to the strix and made the creature move into a dark corner of the crypt. There it growled and hissed unhappily, unable to disobey a direct order from its link.

He saw dark figures quickly approach him; the strix going wild in its corner. Ace felt himself being lifted of the ground and the last thing he heard was the strix's howl, full of anger and powerlessness.

* * *

**While there was some exposition, here's what you need to know:**

**\- Strix (pl. striges) - bird of ill omen, product of metamorphosis that fed on human flesh and blood.**

**\- As to Marco's looks here - imagine a cross between a bird and a cat, moving like Smaug from the hobbit movies. **

**\- You can probably guess that striges are, again (;D), vampires that I've changed to suit my needs :D They come in various shapes, though the name was chosen because Marco has to be a bird :)**

**I guess that's it :D Hope you people are well and are surviving your exams. **

**Thanks for reviews, favs and follows :D**

**~Rhe.**


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